Kindle Edition Download to your Nook (eBook) Download from Smashwords (eBook) Amazon Barnes & Noble.com Long Road Category:  Drama Publisher: Emily Walker ISBN-10:  1481969285 Type: Fiction Pages: 252 Copyright: Jan 4, 2013 ISBN-13: 9781481969284 Price: $3.95 (eBook) A young girl's struggle with abuse, addiction, and abortion. Grace finds herself with a toxic friend and a brand new hobby when she discovers meth. She had a promising future before Grayson came into the picture. A wolf in sheep's clothing he soon shows his true colors and they are painted with black and blue. The drugs cause more problems than they fix, but lost in the intoxicating world of numbness she must find herself through abuse, addiction, and abortion.  Will she let the drugs take her out of the world, and be forever numb, or will an unlikely love pull her out and make her feel again?

Educational, entertaining and heartfelt, I recommend it!
I took a chance with "Long Road, Full Speed Ahead". I wasn't exactly sure what to expect. It didn't take long for me to find myself entrenched in the story. It is very easy to relate to this young girl and the trials and tribulations she experiences when leaving home and going off to college. There were very intense moments and some that made me LOL despite the seriousness of the situation. This story is one that could so easily happen to anyone. There were many situations that I could personally relate to. Not only will this story open your eyes to the world of drug use and abuse, but also controlling relationships that stem into abusive. A true revelation of how one thing can certainly be the gateway for so many other things. Having been in a relationship with an addict at one time, I also found this eye-opening in that aspect that I can better understand what was happening in his world, a world that was very much his own and beyond anything he could have ever explained to me. You will find yourself rooting for the main character and wishing that she was someone you could help. It's touching in a way that I never saw coming and I can't wait to see what happens next. I have my fingers crossed that good things are to come but I can't give specifics without giving spoilers...you'll just have to read it to see! You won't be able to put it down.

Real and Raw
I'm not sure what I expected when I started reading this book, but I know that I got way more than I expected. This book is raw and real. It's not for one with a soft heart. Emily didn't hold back on this book. She didn't try to pretty things up to seem as something they weren't. She kept the situations real and hardcore. There is nothing pretty about this book.....that is what kept me glued to it all afternoon.

If I had known how dumb I was at eighteen, I would have run back to the safety of my parent's house screaming to escape from myself.

Grace is a normal teenage girl. She goes off to college and has had a few experiments with marijuana and alcohol, but nothing like the hard stuff she is about to be introduced to.

One Halloween night my life changed forever. I know now that this was a turning point in my life, a particularly dangerous one.

Grayson is Grace's boyfriend. He used to be sweet and he cared for Grace, but something has changed in him. He is angry all of the time and doesn't care about anything but partying. When Grace starts working for the same hotel that he works for she meets some of his new friends. This is the start of the turning point in her life.

At this point I wanted to scream for Grace, to warn her that these are the kind of people your mother warned you about as a child.

Miranda becomes her best friend. They work together at the hotel. Miranda has an awesome figure...

"I am not usually hungry." I took in her small frame and her giant pupils. "I like to do something that keeps me from it."

I was naive at this point and Grayson explained to me later that she enjoyed a drug called crystal meth.

This is some of the first exposure to hard drugs that sweet Grace has had. The night finally comes when Miranda and Grayson talk her into joining them...(again! I wanted to help this girl! I wanted to tell her no, I have been down the path she is about to go on and I wanted nothing more than to stop her)

When it was my turn, I remember thinking. Something is about to happen, but I had no idea where the feeling came from. I was pretty drunk and the world seemed safe. As I snorted the first thing I had ever tried to put up my nose, I immediately noticed how badly it hurt. It burned like it was trying to take my nose off my face. I thought, This is a mistake, it is never going to stop burning.

And then it hits her....

I knew two things; I wanted more and Grayson was a lying sack who had used meth before last night.

We get to go through the rest of the book following Grace's ups and downs. We see her mistakes...all of the mistakes. The girl she should be is still hidden somewhere beneath the cloth, but the drugs are so strong she may never resurface.

The ending snuck up on me. I was so involved with the story I didn't think the end would come so soon. Please, Emily... let there be a 2nd book! I need a 2nd book. I've grown too accustomed to lovey, dovey stories that are painted pretty. Every once in a while we all need a little ugly; to remind us of the world that we try to ignore.

A drug haze filled ride
I am not one of those people that write a review that will spoil the book for you. I believe in expressing an opinion about a book and let other people have a chance to put the detailed pieces together.
I loved this story. Once I started it, I couldn't put it down. I was even sneaking it in while I was at work. I warn you though, this book is not for the faint of heart. It takes you deep into one young woman's life as she becomes introduced and trapped in the darker side of life with drugs, alcohol, and abusive/ dysfunctional relationships. From the very beginning I was able to picture myself walking in Graces's shoes as the author described the effects that the drugs had on her. There were a few times that the story had hit a little too close to home from my own experiences, and from others that I know that have been in similar circumstances. It is a very dark, edgy tale, that will make you grab hold of your own daughter, and never let her go. I recommend this book to those who enjoy the darker side of the human psyche.