*DISCLAIMER* READ AT YOUR OWN RISK: This book deals with serious topics and themes of drug use, PTSD, self-harm, suicidal thoughts, and suicide attempts.
This book contains realistic depictions of opioid use. Recovered and recovering addicts should proceed with caution.
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The 12 Steps is a gripping Young Adult novel that follows twin brothers Lincoln and Liam as they navigate the weight of trauma, addiction, and family fractures.
Lincoln, a high school senior, is seven months sober and struggling to reconnect with a life that feels just out of reach. He wants to move forward but fears where the future might lead. Liam, also a senior, buries his pain beneath a reckless façade, desperate to outrun the past that haunts him. While one brother fights for control, the other refuses to acknowledge his own unraveling.
When a life-altering incident shakes their already fragile bond, Lincoln and Liam must confront long-buried secrets, painful truths, and the damage that has fractured their family. The 12 Steps is a powerful story of resilience, healing, and the journey toward forgiveness-both of others and of oneself.
"...there were a lot of things I was forced to learn and that made me resent my family for it. One of them is the fact that I learned more about family at rehab than I ever did when I was home."
- Lincoln
"I always had this plan. A plan where I would graduate high school with the highest GPA, get a full-ride baseball scholarship to Stanford University, and then work my way to the major league baseball teams. It was a plan I had made with Lincoln when we were younger. A dream we shared to play baseball together. A dream that died when he overdosed."
- Liam
(In editing)
She's depressed.
She's anorexic.
She's suicidal.
She's insecure.
Abigail has grown up with her three brothers and James, never meeting her parents, who abandoned her at birth. Her brothers were left to take care of her and keep a roof over their heads. Everyday they struggle to take care of Abigail, while working to keep them in their home. Life for them is hard.
Life for Abigail is even harder. She has a dark mind and not by choice. Somewhere along the way she's developed these feelings of loneliness and hopelessness. Everyday is a struggle for her and just getting out of bed is a success.
She meets Zach, a bad boy with a bad reputation. He starts off as a tutor, just to help her out, out of pity. But eventually feelings get involved and Abigail finds herself liking a boy for the first time in her life. Things get serious and she somehow learns about his drug dealing business. Everything gets hectic and Abigail doesn't know what to do with her life anymore. Or if she even wants to live.