Part 1 of this book was absolutely terrible. If you want to read about a girl bashing literally everyone around her for pages upon pages, that is what you will find here. There was a LOT more drugs, alcohol, and s*x than I could have ever imagined. I knew going into this from the back cover that there was some drinking, but I did not expect the rest.
I did like the survival parts of the story though. The beginning and reminiscing over her relationship with her boyfriend were just too much.
I would not recommend this to younger high schoolers due to the content listed and a lot of language.

2 Stars ( )

A group of Tenessee high school students go deep into the woods to party. Ashley is there with her friends and her boyfriend. When her boyfriend's ex shows up, she sees the spark between them. When she stumbles across them together, she runs off in a rage and pain shoeless, drunk, and not paying attention to her surroundings. She wakes in the morning alone, injured, and lost.
While she's got an impressive set of survival skills, she'll need to call on all of them as she tries to find her way back to civilization to get help.
Her learning came from a slightly older guy she idolized a bit and cared for, Davy Beet, but he went missing a few years before in the woods and it is thought he didn't survive.
Gruesome at times, Ashley keeps pushing through, alone with her thoughts, memories, and demons, as the book is broken into chapters by days in which she is trying to survive. ( )

I am infatuated with stories of survival, and this did not disappoint! ( )

Series Info/Source: This is a stand alone book. I borrowed this on audiobook from my library.

Thoughts: This was an amazing and intense survival story. I absolutely loved it and was completely glued to the audiobook. This book was so hard to stop listening to.

This book follows Ashley. Her and her friends go hiking into the Smoky Mountains for a night of partying. After some heavy drinking Ashley stumbles out of her tent to find her boyfriend messing around with another girl. Ashley runs off into the woods in a rage and falls into a ravine and severely injuring herself. Suddenly she finds herself in a life and death situation. Her friends assume she's gone home but she's wandering through the woods trying not to die. She will have to call on every survival skill she has and really push herself to try and make it through.

This was an intense and gory survival story. The book jumps between the strangely dull, yet intense situations Ashley is forced to survive in and Ashley's past, as her mind wanders back to things that have happened to her throughout her life. In particular there was an older boy who was a counselor at her summer camp who loved how dedicated she was to survival and he really helped her learn. She had a bit of a crush on him at the time but then he disappeared into the Smokies himself to never return.

There is a lot of brutal and gory description here that was necessary to convey what Ashley was going through. Just be aware that this book isn't for the faint of heart. I loved Ashley as a character. She had a tough childhood; her dad has always done the best he can but they struggled a lot financially. Ashley learned to make due and is a tough, determined character. Her determination is inspiring and her stubbornness to not let the stupid mistake she made rule her is admirable.

I listened to this on audiobook and the narration is very well done. The narrator captures Ashley's sardonic humor and toughness perfectly without making things sound overly dramatic. This was incredibly hard to stop listening to. You just have to know what is going to happen to Ashley! I went on vacation halfway through this and didn't have time to listen to it; I was dying to finish it when I got back!

My Summary (5/5): Overall this was a very well done survival story. I enjoyed how intense it was and how resourceful Ashley was. It's never overly dramatic but does get pretty gory at times. The format of having Ashley deal with survival issues in the present and then spend time revisiting her past was perfectly done and really balanced the story out nicely. I plan on checking out more books by McGinnis the next time I am in the mood for an intense, yet personable, survival read like this! ( )

Grit and determination and the will to survive. One of the strongest female protagonists I’ve read in a while. She was running, both literally and figuratively, for pleasure, for a better life, from hurt and pain, in the end for herself. ( )