“Addictive from its first pages, Colleen McKeegan’s The Wild One mines all the complexities and darkness of young women in the battleground of summer camp, fashioning a riveting tale of secrets, shame and a harrowing reckoning.”—New York Times bestselling author Megan Abbott
“I couldn't put down this smart and astute page-turning debut. Colleen McKeegan has beautifully crafted a narrative that explores the ways trauma and societal expectations shape the women we become. The engaging prose and razor-sharp twists and turns will keep readers on the edges of their seats until the very last page.”—Jo Piazza, internationally bestselling author of Charlotte Walsh Likes to Win and We Are Not Like Them
“A gripping mystery, but equally as compelling is McKeegan’s exploration of the complicated psyche of female friendships, unresolved trauma, and the desperate lengths girls will go to in order to fit in.” —Elle (Must-Read Books of the Summer)
Amanda Brooks is a born-and-bred New Yorker with an envious life that isn’t as picture perfect as it seems. For over a decade she’s been hiding a dark secret—a secret that goes back to that summer at Camp Catalpa when a man died in the woods. Fellow campers Catherine and Meg were there, too, and in the years since, not one of them has ever spoken about what happened that day.
Until Amanda slips up—and the truth threatens to explode the tightly controlled façade of her life. When her past begins to poison her present, Amanda has no one to turn to except the two women who know her most monstrous self. Reuniting with Catherine and Meg one last time, Amanda is desperate to put the demons of that twisted summer to rest.
But when trusting anyone, even one another, starts to feel like a wildly risky proposition, just how far will these three go to keep the truth from emerging—and their lives from unraveling?