I liked the cover and that this book ended. I found most of this to be predictable even thought the overall ambience was supposed to be tropical but turned claustrophobic/stranded on an island. Underwhelmed.

Thanks to Netgalley, Rachel Hawkins and St Martin's Press for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Available: 1/4/22

I feel like this is a great one for a discussion because you really need to analyze and critically think about this. There are a lot of issues that this book deals with and those need to be discussed in a group environment to really understand how to really feel about it I think.

But, on the surface, Lux was not very likeable, she was so gullible and naive it was unbelievable at times. But I think a lot of her poor choices were made because she was grieving. And I want to say there was some character development, maybe, but that ending was wild!

However, I did LOVE the ending and I thought it was a unique story. It was a pretty quick read and again like a lot of thrillers I have been reading it was full of bad people being bad to other bad people. And I quite enjoy that, I have found.

I would recommend this one just go in knowing that there are some annoying parts.

Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin's for an e-ARC of this book. I am definitely a Rachel Hawkins fan and really enjoyed reading this book.

Reckless Girls tells the story of Lux, a young woman with a sad and challenging past who felt like everything had turned around when she met Nico, her adventurous and incredibly attractive boyfriend. After Lux follows him to Hawaii, the couple is hired by two college students to sail them to a remote, desolate island in the Pacific. The island has a creepy past, but Lux is eager for adventure and hesitant to let her boyfriend charter the ship alone. As the trip goes on and the foursome comes across others seeking a reclusive island stay. the island's supposed curse starts feeling more and more real.

I really enjoyed reading what I would call an adventure thriller in the locked room style. It was fun to get to know the cast of characters and try to guess their varying relationships and secrets. This is the perfect book for anyone who likes to travel (I actually read the whole thing on a plane, which was a great way to devour it!) or dreams of a laid-back, islander lifestyle. The only thing I struggled with was there seemed to be a lot going on with the characters and I wish the action would have started sooner! I felt like I never was on any one character's side. I typically like having someone to root for, but other readers might like this style. Overall, I think it's worth picking up and definitely a great beach read!

3.5 stars rounded up. I was so excited to learn that Rachel Hawkins had written a new book since I enjoyed reading her first book, The Wife Upstairs, so much. Reckless Girls was a great name for this suspenseful book since all the female characters had disguised ulterior motives and hidden secrets. All the characters were well developed and believable. I listened to the audiobook that was brilliantly narrated by Barrie Kreinik. Every time I listen to an audiobook narrated by Barrie Kreinik I have more respect for her as a performer. Reckless Girls was about secrets, dealing with grief and loss, trust, survival and a little romance thrown in for good measure. I loved the cover and thought it was very eye catching.

Timing and presence was everything. Lux McAllister had recently lost her mother to cancer. When Lux had learned of her mother’s diagnosis she did not hesitate to leave college so she could care for her mother full time. Her parents had divorced years ago and Lux and her mother had resettled in California. Her dad married again and had new family. He had cut off all ties with Lux and her mom. Now with her mother’s death, Lux found herself all on her own with little to aspire for. Without the college education she chose to leave behind, Lux found herself destined to waitressing. On one of her shifts, she caught the eye of a very handsome man. There was an instant attraction for both of them. That was the night Lux met Nico. Nico had a boat called the Susannah and he was determined to sail it to Hawaii. Lux followed Nico to Maui where she secured a menial job as a housekeeper for a major tourist hotel. Lux hated her job but she knew her earnings would help Nico pay for the repairs the Susannah needed and then they could take the boat on romantic adventures. The only problem was that Nico was in no rush to leave Maui. He was content staying there for now. By this time, Lux and Nico had been in a romantic relationship for over a year and Lux was beginning to get impatient.

Around this time, Nico was approached by two young women that were traveling together. They asked Nico to captain a boat to take them to Meroe Island, a remote and deserted island that had a history of shipwrecks, being used during World War II and cannibalism..They offered to pay him $50,000 if he would. When Lux met Brittany and Amma she liked them even though she thought she wouldn’t. Lux convinced Nico to have the necessary repairs done to the Susannah so they could use the boat to do this. Brittany and Amma had told Lux and Nico that had met at college and had decided to travel together. This was their last destination before they returned home. With the repairs completed, Nico, Lux, Brittany and Amma set off for Meroe Island. When the Susannah was swept up by a big storm, after only a little into their journey, Lux began to question Nico’s commitment to protect her and care for her. Seeds of doubt began to surface in Lux’s mind about Nico’s feelings for her but she put them aside for now. Finally, Meroe Island came into view. It was breathtaking and picture perfect but another boat was spotted anchored by its shore. It was a big, fancy and well maintained catamaran that boasted the name, Azure Sky. Lux, Nico, Brittany and Amma were not alone on the island. They had company. Jake and Eliza welcomed them to Meroe Island and the six of them settled into an easy and comfortable friendship until another boat invaded their tranquility more than a week later. That seventh person upset everything and strange and unsettling things began to occur.

I enjoyed most of Reckless Girls by Rachel Hawkins. The last part of the audiobook and the ending left me unsatisfied and wondering what had happened. Most of Reckless Girls was so promising. Unfortunately, the ending did not work for me. I can’t wait to see what Rachel Hawkins will write next even though I did not totally love this one.

Thank you to Macmillan Audio for allowing me to listen to this audiobook through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

I absolutely adored this book. The magnitude of characters, the twists and turns, and the picturesque settings were so fun to read. The female friendship traveling trope is so underdone and I was so happy that this one didn’t fall flat for me. I was intrigued the whole time I was reading it while at the same time not wanting it to end. My favorite by this author to date!

This book was just perfection. The pacing was beautiful for me. I read as the story and everyone's lies and secrets unraveled but I didn't feel like I was just being not told. There were no moments of I have a secret but you can't know. The characters were not fully fleshed out but boiled down to events that are shaping who they are now and it just worked so well. I love ending. I am so glad it didn't go the way so many would have.

2.5⭐
Thank you so much to St. Martin's Press and Netgalley for providing an e-arc and ALC. All thoughts and opinions are still my own.

I was really excited about this next thriller release from Rachel Hawkins but unfortunately this one was a bit of a miss for me. I didn't find anything about this book thrilling, suspenseful, or shocking.

This is told in dual timelines from multiple POVs. And I actually quite liked the format and style. However, I thought that by giving glimpses of the past, the twist became very obvious. And because of that the shock and twist factor I love in thrillers was nonexistent.

I also thought this was just lacking a general sense of tension and unease. It seemed the like author was trying to make the island feel ominous by throwing in random mentions of how past people on the island felt watched or like they weren't alone. But nothing actually felt dangerous or unsettling. It was definitely a case of the author telling me the island was spooky rather than it actually feeling spooky.

While I love a closed door mystery (limited cast of isolated characters), I personally found that the focus of the story being on personal relationship drama of the characters for so long, brought down the pace too much. The first 75% of this is really just relationship drama and the main character complaining. So by the time the action/reveals started happening, I was extra disappointed by the non-shocking twist.

I enjoyed the themes and style choices in here, unfortunately the mystery/thriller aspect itself wasn't everything I hoped. This was missing the suspense and ominous feeling of a dangerous, isolated island. And in the end I was left disappointed.

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and Ms. Hawkins for the opportunity to read an ARC of this title. An honest review was requested but not required.

I'm not a frequent thriller reader (at least, not to the point where I can suss out all the whodunnits and hows). I prefer to be taken for an exciting (literary) ride and dumped at the conclusion with a great big thump. I'd say this book delivered on that promise, even though the middle was a little slower than I'd prefer and the resounding thump at the end was more of a... bump.

Can't say too much without spoiling plot points, but basically if you've read the jacket/blurb, you have an idea. Lux and her boyfriend, smarmy smooth operator Nico, are hired to sail Amma and Brittney from Hawaii to a deserted tropical island, Meroe, out in the deep Pacific. Of course, the island isn't quite as deserted as Lux had hoped, and what follows is, according to the author, inspired by And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie.

The beginning was superb, which helped carry me through the slower middle. Once I got going, I definitely could not put the book down. I really want to add feedback about my suspicions and thoughts but there's no way to do that without spoiling. Suffice to say, I thought I had sort of figured it out, but then the author turned that screw another quarter turn. The atmospheric nature of Meroe is also really well done; I've been to deserted tropical cays (too small to really call islands) and there is a sort of low buzz from insects plus a kind of shimmer from the intense heat that you can *almost* hear, which together I could totally see driving someone half batty.

I will say this: the characters definitely skewed what I would call "new adult." Their actions, behavior, dialogue, relationships etc. all seemed a little immature to me, an only-sort-of-elderly reader (get off my lawn!). On the other hand: that cover is GORGEOUS. 😍

I would recommend this to readers looking for thrills and suspense with a side of tropical escapism, especially readers that are either a little younger or with a decent tolerance for dumb college-age decision making. Hey, I calls em like I sees em 😉

Lux isn't living the life she imagined when she follows Nico to Hawaii. Then one day a pair of young women pay them $50,000 to take them to a very remote island and stay with them for two weeks. Upon arrival, however, there is already a boat there. Not the solitude they were looking forward to.
The six quickly become friends (mostly).
When yet another boat arrives, things start to go downhill.
This island has claimed lives before. Will it clam more now?
The beginning grabbed my interest right away. The middle dragged a little. The ending came quickly with a few more surprises.

Many thanks to netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the advance copy to read and give my honest review.

ux and her boyfriend Nico are living in Hawaii with plans to sail the world in Nicos boat, The Susannah. Lux has had a family loss and is looking for a place to belong. They are hired by two college girls, Brittany and Amma, to sail them to an island in the Pacific Ocean called Meroe Island that is named after a shipwreck. There are rumors of cannibalism and death surrounding the island but it is the most beautiful place they have ever seen. They are surprised to find another boat anchored when they arrive. The Azire Sky with a beautiful, rich couple on board. Jake and Eliza are welcoming and they all are fast friends. Things start to fall apart when a strange guy arrives and they realize they don’t know each other. They each have secrets that start to come out. Then one of them disappears. Then they find a body.

I enjoyed this one and it was a quick read. Their are changes in POV as well as aback and forth from Then and Now. I liked Luxs character and the tropical setting was amazing. The ending was just okay for me. It wasn’t a big wow factor like I had hoped for. Some of it I saw coming but some of it was a surprise.

Thanks to @netgalley and the publisher for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I loved this book. It was suspenseful and a little creepy. It kept me on my toes. The characters were very compelling and complicated.

I expected pure insanity and got nothing less! Anything locked room immediately gets a plus in my eyes but my biggest complaint for this novel is pacing. I think after the popularity of Lucy Foley we've been seeing thrillers that are 80% gossip and mildly building suspense and the last 20% is full-throttle plot twist upon plot twist. And while the ending didn't disappoint me, it's a lot to compact in a huge "villain monologue". In a perfect world, and like modeled after A Kind Worth Killing, we get a big reveal at around the halfway point of the novel and go from there. But I was a lot more interested in these characters than expected and the thrills did satisfy me!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

Reckless Girls takes us on a thrilling island adventure where fun is a must and secrets are buried deep.

This was such a fun thriller. It did start off a little slow but once I hit the halfway point I was hooked. I really enjoyed the characters having an entire island to themselves. It helped create the eerie feeling that you would get from being stranded on an island away from civilization with total strangers. There was some back and forth between timelines which I thought was pretty good. I found the back stories of the characters to be interesting. I liked what they added to the story.

The characters were just fine for me. There wasn't anyone who I particularly gravitated towards. They all played their roles well and it was just fine.

If you're looking for a beach thriller I'd absolutely give this one a shot.

I read Reckless Girls as part of a buddy read with @taggersextraordinaire and I had a blast. I wrote my review prior to the discussion and then afterward, I had to rewrite the whole thing. This book, for me, was just ok, but then once we all started to discuss it, I realized how much I liked it and the storyline. #buddyreads for the win!!

I’ll start off by saying that Reckless Girls was a slow burn for me. Once I got to the second half of the book, things started to pick up and then I was flipping pages late into the night.

Hired by two women to sail them to Meroe Island, Lux and Nico set sail with rest, relaxation and a little bit of adventure on the agenda. It sounds perfect, right? What could go wrong?

When they get to the island, another couple had already arrived. They all decided to make the best of it and enjoy their new friendships. That’s when the weird stuff starts to happen and Lux realizes how alone and isolated, they are on the island. It kind of reminded me of the television show Lost!! I didn’t see all the twists and turns coming and that kept me interested in turning the page.

The story is told from multiple POV’s. I can’t say that I particularly liked any of the characters, they all had their own agendas and lots of secrets between them, but it all worked for this storyline.

If you are looking for a wild and crazy vacation to a deserted island from the comfort of your own reading area, this is one book you will want to read!

I struggled between rating this 2 or 3 stars, but eventually went with 3 because the ending was solid and it made up for what I didn’t like in the beginning.

Reckless Girls started promising but I was so bored from about 25-80% of it. Maybe not bored, but just indifferent to what the characters were doing, due to me hating every single character. I also could not care less about the “before” chapters, they felt unnecessarily long.

The two most irksome were Nico and Lux. Nico disregarded EVERYTHING and acted so casual over scary or important events. Meanwhile, Lux reacted properly but with one word from Nico she’d be swayed and say she was wrong. She was insecure and always wanted to be the “cool girlfriend”, and it was just so tiresome. Brittany was forgettable, and the rest were just annoying.

The ending was satisfying and the of the book had been shorter, it probably would have impacted me more.

3.5 stars

Thanks to St. Martin's Press for an ARC of Reckless Girls, out on 1/24! This book was a quick read with a great tropical setting.

Lux and her boyfriend Nico have spent months in Maui, saving up money to fix up a sailing boat to take on an adventure. They get the chance of a lifetime to take tourists Amma and Brittany to Meroe Island and make enough cash to fund their future adventures. Meroe Island is off the beaten path and full of creepy folklore, but is said to have legendary views. Once the group arrives, they meet Jake and Eliza and become instant friends. After a few memorable days in paradise, things turn dark and Lux's dream vacation turns into a nightmare.

Reckless Girls was an entertaining read, but its characters were very pretentious and unlikable. I liked some of the backstory more than the present day plot, but the plot moved quickly enough that I never got bored. There were a ton of f*bombs in this one, which didn't bother me, but may be a turn off for some readers. Some of the letters scattered throughout were confusing to me, and I wasn't sure if they had much meaning to the storyline. Also, the romances and surrounding drama were a bit juvenile, as was the backstabbing done by pretty much every character. Overall, it was a good read with a few surprises that kept it enjoyable.

Reckless Girls is a fun twisting story through the lives of a group of people who are all hiding things and lying to each other. A little bit Gone Girl a little bit Lord of the Flies. Once the story got going I couldn't put it down. the switch of perspectives is done perfectly to give just enough information to know something more going on while still leaving a lot of mystery. I read this after reading The Wife Upstairs earlier this year and this was even better.

To sum it up: Locked room thriller, but make it deserted island with a creepy past full of 20-30 something’s.

This may have been a slow burn to start off with, but I didn’t want to put it down. I finished it in about a day and I may have glared at any person that tried to talk to me while I was reading.

I will say that I did predict the ending at about 75% in, but it was still fun getting to that point!

I’d say this one is perfect for anyone looking to get into thrillers or anyone that prefers light thrillers as this isn’t to scary or violent. It’s also perfect for vacation.

A couple is hired to take 2 young women to a deserted island for a 2 week romp. There, they meet another couple who want to party. The 6 of them get along pretty well. Then, another man shows up on the island.

Thanks to #NetGalley #StMartinsPress and #MacMillianAudio for an electronic copy of both the book and audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Six strangers escape to gorgeous but deserted Meroe Island. Perfect adventure - beautiful people, carefree and careless. But as creepy legends of murder and cannibalism unfold, the strangers discover the island is littered with skulls and booby traps. Quickly, this dissolves into a “locked room” thriller with vibes of Cast Away, Gilligans Island, Lost, and Lord Of The Flies.

I love a good locked door - can’t escape thriller! The story starts strong. Each reckless girl gives both past and present POV, developing motive to why she’s escaping to a deserted island. The reckless girls are relentless in their motivation. It's nice to see girl empowerment in a thriller. But I felt the histories were a bit underdeveloped, causing ambivalence to whether the girls survived or not. The ending takes a big turn that will split readers; some will enjoy the big twist, and others will not. As many know, I’m not a fan of epilogues, and I didn’t need this one either. I can surmise what happens next. 😉