Toxic by Nicci Cloke

Synopsis (from Goodreads) 

Pages: 304 

Publisher: Hot Key Books 

Released: 26th of July 2018 

 Hope has never been happier. She's on her way to Crete, after a group of her friends have made her an honorary 'lad' and let her tag along on their boys' holiday. There's a slight complication in that one of those boys, Logan, is Hope's ex-boyfriend, but they're still friends and Hope's pretty confident it won't be too awkward.

The next couple of days are exactly what Hope was hoping for - lazy days in the sun, and long, drunken conversations. She can't help but notice that Logan's flirting with her. Logan and Hope end up alone and Hope is horrified when, after she leans in to kiss him, Logan completely rejects her.

Embarrassed and annoyed, Hope is on a mission to get drunk, and with the alcohol flowing, and the sun going down, Hope's starts having a great time.

The next thing Hope knows, she's being woken up on the beach by two strangers. It's 9 o'clock the next morning and she can't remember anything about the previous night . . . what on earth happened?

What I Have to Say 

This is an excellent look at drinking culture, lad culture and toxic masculinity among other things. 

I have to admit. I've never understood drinking culture. I've never understood these party destinations that people go away to just to spend a week getting drunk in a foreign country either. So it was interesting to read about a group having a fun time out getting drunk and partying in bars. Some of it actually sounded reasonably enjoyable, until it went dark really, really fast. 

The first part of the book has a very different tone to the rest of the book. The first part is a fairly lighthearted story about young people on holiday. Obviously, I was expecting it to go bad, but I wasn't quite prepared for how dark it's got. It was like Cloke painting this happy, fun picture of a nice group of friends in the first part and then ripped it off in the second to show the darkness hiding inside the seemingly nice, normal exterior. A little bit of a shock to the system, but a very interesting way of showing how these things can hide away in dark corners until you see it. Because it resembled life. When you start to see these things, you start seeing them everywhere and you can't imagine how you were so blind before. The perfect metaphor. 

So though this book definitely lulls you at the start into thinking this will be a fairly nice summer read and then tramples over your feelings and leaves you feeling horrified and slightly sick, it really is a fantastic read. 

My thanks go to Hot Key Books and Netgalley for providing me with this copy for review.