Reckless Girls

 Title: Reckless Girls

Author: Rachel Hawkins

What’s it about?

Lux, a twenty-something that recently lost her mother to cancer, wants to travel the world with her boyfriend Nico. The problem is they can’t start until Nico gets enough money to repair their boat. Enter Amma and Brittany, two other twenty-somethings that hire Lux and Nico to take them to the mysterious Meroe Island. Meroe Island is said to be the final resting place of shipwrecked sailors from years ago. It might be haunted, maybe just cursed. Amma and Brittany think visiting there will be a great way to wrap up their globe-hopping trip. The girls pay in advance so the boat can get fixed up and pretty soon the four sail away from Hawaii and to Meroe Island. 

On arrival, they find another couple already there. It’s okay though because the two groups quickly become friends and they all decide to have fun. A little partying, a little adventuring, lots of sun and swimming, sounds like the perfect vacation. Unfortunately, things don’t stay all fun and games, instead, they start becoming deadly. Lux will need to navigate the dangers of the island and the people she shares it with if she wants to make it out alive.

What do I think?

There is a lot I enjoyed about this book. It is winter and cold where I live so I was happy to snuggle up in a warm blanket and read about a tropical island adventure. One thing that needs to be said upfront, minor spoilers, all of the girls have lost someone in their lives. Their losses are talked about and so is their grief, so if that is something you aren’t able to handle I’d stay away. I think it is pretty obvious that the book is going to have death in it, but I want to warn anyone thinking of reading it that there is more than just the usual characters getting killed. 

Lux, the main character, lost her mother to cancer. Her parents divorced when she was young and her father remarried and started a new family without Lux being a part of it. Before the start of the book, Lux doesn’t have any real friends outside of her boyfriend, Nico. She’s a young lonely lost girl and, for me at least, that explains most of her actions in the book. 

Hawkins wrote Nico to be a likable guy. Over the course of the story that facade slips but I never find myself hating him. Unfortunately, I also never found myself invested in Lux’s relationship with him. It’s okay though because the book really isn’t about Lux and Nico. In my opinion, it’s actually about Lux’s relationship with Amma, Brittany, and Eliza, the three other central female characters in the story. As the book goes on we learn more about each of their lives and how they ended up on Meroe Island. 

Reckless Girls is more than a fluff thriller novel. Hawkins offers the reader an opportunity to ponder many ideas about the social differences between men and women, sisterhood, grief, and loss. I didn’t expect all of that when I started reading and was pleasantly surprised. The story is split between first-person chapters with Lux and third-person chapters with the rest of the girls. I think Reckless Girls manages a nice balance between thoughtful and fluff and could be a book club read or a beach read.

Rating: 4 /5 

Did I buy it? This was my Book of the Month pick for January 2022. I will not be keeping it in my permanent collection.