There has been a lot of hyperbole and speculation of late over Catherine Hardwicke and her recent and sudden exit from the Twilight franchise. CB's own Katey Rich has been very vocal about her feelings on what happened, although Hardwicke herself went on record this week, telling E! Online that, similar to Chris Weitz's decision not to take on the third movie, the schedule was just too tight for her to feel she could do it justice, saying; “I really thought it would be better for somebody else, who hadn't just been working every day for two years without a day off... I wanted to do it only if I was going to make it better than Twilight."

Today Entertainment Weekly is reporting that Summit boss Erik Feig has announced that none other than the Catherine Hardwicke will be directing their adaptation of children's fantasy novel If I Stay, the story of a girl who finds herself in an out-of-body experience when a traffic accident puts her in a coma. While watching over everything going on around her, she has to come to the ultimate decision on whether to die or carry on living. It all sounds a little too much like a knock-off of The Lovely Bones to me, but it's hard to judge at this point, as the book isn't released until April 2nd.

Feig said, ”"When we were thinking of the perfect director to capture the emotion, grace and passion of this beautiful book, one filmmaker became the clear and only choice: Catherine Hardwicke."

It's safe to say that if Hardwicke had indeed been unceremoniously ejected from the Twilight franchise, it's unlikely she'd be so quick to jump back in to bed with the very studio that sacked her. With this announcement, lets put the entire issue behind us and look to the future and the new movies from Hardwicke and the Twilight franchise. If I Stay is slated for a 2011 release.