Going Too Far by Jennifer Echols

Meg is a wild and rebellious girl - she drives a motorcycle, has blue hair, indulges in casual sex, has a pot-head boyfriend and is counting down her last few months of high school. She has been looking forward to that moment her whole life - the moment when she can finally escape her parents, her job and the small town she’s always lived in. Somewhere different where she can be someone new - go to college, etc. And even more exciting than all that is her upcoming Spring Break trip to Mexico.... But one night’s stupid decision to hang with her friends and boyfriend on a train bridge (where some kids were killed a few years back) - lands her in jail and having to cancel her trip to spend quality time with the officer who arrests her.

Officer John After has the bright idea that Meg and her friends (sans boyfriend - whose dad is a hotshot attorney) should learn from their mistakes and thinks that each one should ride around with the emergency personnel called out to the bridge the night of their escapade. And guess who Meg has to drive around with for five nights? Yep, Officer After - who ends up being much younger (and cuter - okay, and hotter) then Meg originally thought.

Meg doesn’t understand why John would choose to stay in a small town - to help protect and serve and even talk dumb kids out of making wrong choices. She questions everything he learned at the police academy... but when he pushes back, demanding to know why she won't be tied down, they will drive each other to the edge -- and over.

I love character driven novels like this. Most of the book is just Meg and John - sitting in his cop car reminiscing and just opening up to each other little by little about their hopes, dreams, aspirations... life. When you first read about Meg - the way she looks and how she acts, you can picture and see her one way, but as she slowly unravels you find a person that you immediately side with, whose witty remarks have you laughing out loud or at the brink of tears. John comes off as the shy, quiet type with this underlying strength. But together they are perfect - they have such awesome chemistry that I was really saddened when this book was over. I wanted more of them. As their secrets are revealed you can't help but root for their love to overcome any obstacles.

I was sucked in from the first chapter and it was hard to put down (and I will confess I didn’t really do much of that). I sat down and read it and didn’t stop until I was done with it. I was surprised by how much I really liked it - I thought it would be a cute little romance without too much depth - but it was so much more than that. It was thoughtful, sexy and plainly unputdownable. I highly recommend this one.