Following eight years of writing and research, Nicole Waybright recently completed her narrative nonfiction work, Long Way Out, in which she tells the true story of her coming-of-age struggles while deployed as an officer on a U.S. Navy destroyer. With heartbreaking and fearless realism, the author chronicles the despair and psychological crisis that she experienced when she discovered she was ill-suited – and philosophically opposed – to Navy life, while yet in the early days of a five-year military obligation.

The story is recounted in graphic and historically accurate detail based on the author’s five years of service as a commissioned officer in the Surface Warfare (SWO) Navy, during the era of the first wave of women to be stationed aboard combatant ships. Alongside the author's turbulent psychological journey, Long Way Out offers a glimpse into the tragic story of the notorious executive officer – the first woman in U.S. history to command an Aegis destroyer and be stripped of command for “cruelty and maltreatment” of her crew – under whom the author served. TIME magazine later called this commander “the Female Captain Bligh.”

An unlikely ending finds the author with a radicalized self-understanding, committed to seeking self-awareness and exploring her new-found interest in building a culture of peace.

Long Way Out is available on www.ecrater.com (print), Amazon (print), and Amazon Kindle (ebook).

About the Author

NICOLE WAYBRIGHT is a full-time writer and featured speaker and resides in New England. Nicole received her BS in Mechanical Engineering from Boston University in 1996. She was honorably discharged from the Navy in 2001. In 2006 she received her MA in Spanish Literature from the University of Rhode Island.