Eva

Author: Peter Dickinson

First line: Eva was lying on her back.

Why you should read this book: With a primatologist for a father, Eva was raised in close proximity with some of the few remaining chimpanzees on a crowded, paved-over planet, so when a terrible accident leaves her human body broken and persuades her parents to approve a risky procedure that implants her consciousness into the body of a chimp named Kelly, Eva decides to make the best of the situation. Embracing the part of her that will remain Kelly, Eva tries to balance the mundane human activities of going to school and making friends with her need for chimp socialization, while coping with the distressing fact that the media owns her body. When she makes friends with a jet-setting socialite whose radical ideas seem to predict some hope for the future on a distressed world, Eva must begin making decisions that could spell the difference between life and death for sentient creatures on Earth.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You're reckon that what the world needs is a couple more strip malls and a lot more parking spaces.