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Lux has followed her hot boyfriend, Nico, from San Diego to Hawaii. He comes from wealth but has decided to just live a chill seafaring life on his boat — once he can get it seaworthy again. For months, she’s been working at a posh hotel and living in someone else’s living room with Nico, waiting for the glamour and adventure to start.
When two college-age women approach Nico with the proposal of taking them out to the tiny atoll of Meroe Island for a couple of weeks of off-the-grid vacationing, Lux is excited that their dreams can start coming to pass. The girls are going to pay for the repairs to the Susannah as well as give him a hefty fee for the job. And they invite Lux along.
After a three-day sail that includes a rough storm, the four arrive at the harbor of Meroe Island. There, they are dismayed to see another boat already anchored. But the rich occupants of the sleek catamaran Azure Sky are super-friendly and welcoming and happy to share all they have brought along. And that includes much finer fare than the Susannah has (like a very well-stocked bar). Soon, the six new friends are having a good time and living the high life. Lux is able to settle in and relax and enjoy being part of a group, which she hasn’t felt for a long time.
Meroe Island, however, has a dark past, and as the group explores the island they find some remnants of that. They mostly shake off what they find, but then their idyll is fully disrupted by an odd, lone stranger. Soon enough, cracks in the various relationships show up, and as the book progresses, readers learn a bit at a time about the dark pasts (and true motives for this vacation) of various characters.
When they’re cut off from contact from civilization, things get real. One person goes missing, and then another turns up dead. It turns from vacation idyll into nightmare, and it’s not clear who may survive.
Reckless Girls is a serviceable thriller, with characters of dubious intents stuck on an isolated island together. I’d have enjoyed it more if it weren’t for the constant profanity. It just seemed so unnecessary and bombarded my senses. I won’t be reading another adult book of Hawkins’s (like The Wife Upstairs) from here on out.
Rated: High. Profanity includes 188 uses of strong language (!!!), about 90 instances of moderate profanity, 13 uses of mild language, and about 55 instances of the name of Deity in vain. Violence includes several murders by various methods, with mild or moderate details, and some fighting. Sexual content includes a couple of sex scenes and references to couples having sex, but they’re fairly brief. There are scenes talking about drug dealing, and there are a lot of scenes involving lots of drinking, and one scene with characters all using drugs. A character’s family was killed in a drunk driving accident.
*I received an ARC in exchange for my honest review.
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