Amy & Roger's Epic Detour By Morgan MatsonAfter Amy's father dies in a car crash, everything that this California girl took for granted changes overnight and sice then Amy has gone into a shell and dress to not be notice and has pulled totally away from friends and feels she is to blame for the accident. Her twin brother Charlie is shipped off to rehab in North Carolina after being on drugs for about a year, that Amy knew of.
Her mother accepts a teaching position in Connecticut, leaving Amy home alone for a month to finish her junior year of high school. Then her mom arranges to get Amy to Connecticut via a cross-country drive with her mothers family friend son, 19-year-old Roger who is going to Philadelphia to spend the summer with his dad. Amy doesn´t drive anymore, because she panics even when she is just in a car.
Her mom has planned the whole trip, but they soon decides to take a detour, to make it a real road trip. First they go to Yosemite National Park, because Amy always went there with her dad. Then the dad after they hit Nevada and soon they find out they are on the loniest road in America, then they come to Utah and pretends to be a couple who has a reservations there to get a hotel room, only it turns out to be the honeymoon suite. Soon Roger tells her he wants to go to Colorado Springs, where his college are, where Roger is hoping to work things out with his ex girlfriend Hadley, who he thought was going to be there but isn´t, when they get there.
They stay at a college house where other people who are stayig on campus the summer are living and she meets and sleeps in Roger´s friends Bronwyn´s room and they go to a party. Then the next morning her suitecase is gone, but Roger tells her it is in the car and when they drive away he gives her a note from Bronwyn and all her normal clothe (camoflage clothe) is gone shifted out with Dresses, skirts etc. that is Bronwyn´s stuff and Amy is actually fine with it.
Then They go to Kansas, where Roger tells her he wants to go to Kentucky, because Hadley is there because he wants to talk to her. They then go to Wichita, where they meet up at the golf course with Roger´s college friend Drew and she meets Drews friend and when she gets alone with him on the track, because she forgot her shoes she admits her dad died.
Then when they find a hotel to sleep in she calls her mom in the morning and admits that they aren´t on the planned trip and when they have to pay with her credit card it is declined and they gather the money they have and both Roger and her wants to keep going. When they get to Louisville, Kentucky - where Hadley lives, Hadley isn´t there eventhough Roger talked to her houts ago. They meet her brother Lucien, who Amy invites to Dinner and he offeres them to stay in their guest house on the estate.
That night after Roger has went to bed, she goes outside and Lucien comes in the jeep he drives around on the estate and he shows her garden sculptures he makes. After a conversation where she kind of tells him about her family, she takes a chance and drives the jeep for a minute. then the next morning Roger talks to Hadley and he tells Hadley when they drive away that he found out that it has been over between them for awhile.
She admits that he father loved Elvis and that they where suppose to go to Graceland Elvis´s hometown this summer, so they go there. After on the way out of there she admits that her brother is in rehab and that she wants to go to North Carolina to see him. The next day she visit her brother, but has to go through a window into some girls room and when she mention she is Charlie´s sister, they know who she is because they have group and Charlie talks about her. She talk to Charlie and his roommate ask her to deliver a letter in a Dairy Queen in Richmond.
Then outside with Roger in the car, she can´t hold it back any longer and tells him how her dad died in the accident and how they where goig to find Charlie who was out in some shit because of drugs, and that she was driving when a car hit them. He tells her it wasn´t his fault and that he has never lied to her and she starts crying. At the Dairy Queen they get some ice cream and suddenly she wants to kiss Roger and she does it and he kiss her back and admits that he has been waiting for the kiss.
In Maryland they stop for a hotel because it is raining really much and they dress up and goes to dinner and later have sex. Then the next day she decides to drive and after some time it is fine. She tells him it is better for him if she just drives him to Phily and then she can drive back herself and after some time he agrees. In Phily she drops him of and they decide to just find out what will happen to them and that he will call her later. She calls her mom ones crossing the state line in Connecticut and get the adrees and her mom is stunned she is driving.
This wasn´t just a road trip on the road it was also an emotional one for amy, who finds her way back to herself, by meeting new people and places and meeting strangers where she tells them stuff and they are friendly and she works with herself, standing up to her mother, talking with her brother and going to a trip to Graceland, she never wanted to do without her father. I really like books that has road trips in it, and i really want to do it one day myself, just get out a drive without knowing where and just feeling free and have no worries. There actually isn´t much happening in the book, but you keep reading, because you want to find out what happened to Amy and her family and what blame she had in it.
I loved everytime they used the name Hillary and Edmund, i just laughed every time. I like that it is the little things like the sunglasses that she don´t want, that has a big point in the story, because her own got smashed in the crash. A thing i also like where the pictures, travelnotes and receivings. Because you feel like you is in the story more and that the author really took time to make the book and that she did the specific road trip herself. The cover is also really good for the book and the fact that the person´s on it holding hand in hand going into something different for each of them, but coming out together on the road.
Grade: 7
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