New Moon recap

After a birthday accident convinces Edward that his vampire world endangers Bella, he leaves Forks with his family, plunging Bella into a deep depression. She slowly recovers through a close friendship with Jacob Black and discovers that reckless danger lets her hear Edward's voice. She learns that Jacob and his friends are werewolves who protect the tribe from vampires, and that they are hunting Victoria, who wants Bella dead in revenge for her mate James. When Bella cliff-dives and nearly drowns, Alice's visions lead Edward to believe Bella has died, and he travels to Italy to provoke the vampire rulers, the Volturi, into killing him. Bella and Alice race to save him. Reunited, they are spared by the Volturi on the condition that Bella eventually become a vampire. Edward admits he never stopped loving her; the Cullens agree she may be changed, deepening the rift with Jacob.

Previously: Bella Swan moved to the rainy town of Forks and fell in love with Edward Cullen, discovering that he and his adoptive family are vampires who feed on animals rather than people. Edward loved her in return despite the danger her scent posed to him. A nomadic tracker vampire, James, hunted Bella for sport and bit her before the Cullens destroyed him; Edward drew the venom out to keep her human. Bella emerged devoted to Edward and eager to become a vampire herself so they could be together forever, though Edward refused to change her. James's red-haired mate, Victoria, escaped, her thirst for revenge unresolved. Bella had also renewed a childhood friendship with Jacob Black of the nearby Quileute reservation.

At Bella's eighteenth birthday party, hosted by the Cullens, a small paper cut sends Jasper lunging at her blood, and Bella is hurt in the scramble to hold him back. Shaken by how close his family came to killing her, Edward concludes that his world is too dangerous for her. Days later he takes Bella into the woods and tells her he no longer wants her, then leaves with his entire family, disappearing from Forks. Bella, believing she has lost him and the future she wanted, is left devastated and alone.

Bella sinks into a deep, months-long depression after Edward's departure, going through the motions of life while feeling hollow. She is briefly lost in the forest before a reservation youth, Sam Uley, carries her home. In time she reconnects with Jacob Black, and their growing friendship slowly revives her. Together they restore two old motorcycles, and Bella discovers that reckless, dangerous acts make her hear Edward's voice in her mind, a sensation she comes to crave. She deliberately courts danger to keep hearing him, while leaning on Jacob's steady warmth.

Jacob abruptly grows distant and falls under Sam Uley's influence, leaving Bella hurt and confused. Alone in the forest, she is confronted by Laurent, a vampire who reveals that Victoria is hunting her for revenge and who then tries to kill her himself. A pack of enormous wolves drives him off. Bella soon learns the truth: Jacob and Sam's group are shape-shifters, werewolves whose ancient purpose is to protect the tribe from vampires, and they are now hunting Victoria as she stalks the area. Jacob and Bella's bond deepens even as the danger around her sharpens.

Craving Edward's remembered voice, Bella leaps from a high cliff into the sea and nearly drowns before Jacob rescues her. Alice Cullen, who can see the future, glimpses Bella jumping and, believing her dead, returns to Forks. Through a tragic misunderstanding, Edward comes to believe Bella has died, and, unable to bear existing without her, resolves to end his own life by provoking the Volturi, the ancient vampire rulers, into destroying him. Alice and Bella race to Italy to stop him before he steps into sunlight before a crowd and forces the Volturi's hand.

Bella reaches Edward in Volterra just in time to stop him from stepping into the sunlight, and the two are reunited, each having believed the other lost. The Volturi leaders, especially Aro, spare them but rule that Bella, a human who knows too much about vampires, must eventually be turned into one of them or destroyed. Edward and his family return to Forks, and Edward confesses that he never stopped loving Bella and left only to protect her. The Cullens vote, and most agree that Bella should be allowed to become a vampire, which Edward reluctantly accepts on the condition that she marry him first. But peace is fragile: Victoria is still at large, and the treaty between the Cullens and the werewolves forbids the Cullens from changing a human, straining Bella's bond with Jacob.

Bella saves Edward from the Volturi in Volterra, and the couple reunites, their love reaffirmed after months of grief and misunderstanding. The Volturi decree that Bella cannot stay human indefinitely: she must be transformed into a vampire or killed, and they intend to check that it is done. Back in Forks, Edward confesses that leaving was an attempt to protect her that nearly destroyed them both. The Cullen family votes and largely supports changing Bella, and Edward agrees to do it himself, but only if she will marry him first, hoping to give her the human experiences he thinks she is sacrificing. Two dangers remain open as the book closes. Victoria is still hunting Bella and has not been caught. And the ancient treaty between the Cullens and the Quileute wolves forbids any Cullen from biting a human, so Edward's promise to change Bella threatens to break the truce and set the vampires and werewolves, including a heartbroken Jacob, against each other.