Breakout

by Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D Jackson, Nic Stone

For Thurgood Marshall Academy's best and brightest--five friends who've been thick as thieves since kindergarten--this spring break is all about forgetting: they want nothing more than to wash away last year's tragedy, and the human-shaped hole it left in their friend group.

It's a hole the new kid, Anthony Brooks, seems to fit right into. So when he invites the Five to join him on a private island for a week at his dad's luxury resort, they agree with zero hesitation. No one's counting on a freak tropical storm swooping in and killing the vibe. And speaking of killing, they're also ill-prepared for the mounting collection of dead bodies... including (another) one of their own.

As their dream trip unravels, everything they tried to leave behind--secrets, lies, betrayals, dead best friends--seems to be washing up on the shore of their lives for everyone to see. Will any of them make it out alive?

Genres: Young Adult, Mystery Thriller, Thriller, Mystery, Horror, Romance

352 pages, Hardcover

Expected publication June 2, 2026

About the author

Dhonielle Clayton is a New York Times bestselling author of The Marvellers series, The Belles series, Shattered Midnight, co-author of Blackout, Whiteout, The Rumor Game, and of the Tiny Pretty Things duology, a Netflix original series. She hails from the Washington, D.C. suburbs on the Maryland side. She taught secondary school for several years, and is a former elementary and middle school librarian. She is COO of the non-profit We Need Diverse Books. She is the President and founder of Cake Creative and Electric Postcard Entertainment, IP story companies creating diverse books for all ages. She’s an avid traveller, and always on the hunt for magic and mischief. Find her on Instagram: @brownbookworm.

Reviews

[Brady · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you Quill Tree Books and Netgalley for this eARC, these opinions are my own. I always enjoy a good mystery within a mystery and this one had me hooked! Last year during Spring Break Keisha died, she was part of Thurgood Marshall Academy’s The Six. Six friends who’d been together since kindergarten and were all filthy rich. Now there’s only five and Noelle is the outcast after she gave broke the pact the five of them had made after Keisha’s death. Anthony Brooks is new to school and he’s made it his mission to get to know these five friends, Noelle’s even his girlfriend. Now these six are off on another Spring Break adventure, this time at Anthony’s father’s island resort where they’ll have the island to themselves as the resort is being partially renovated. Soon they are hit by tropical storms, all communication and electricity is gone from the island, and to top it off someone else is dead. It’s Déjà vu for the five friends, but who did it? As the already fractured friend group beings to fracture even more they’ll have to decide who can they trust? Especially when they all have secrets, secrets they’ll do anything to keep. As more people die it becomes clear that someone is out to get them, maybe someone who’s determined to find out what really happened to Keisha. What are the friends hiding? And can they make it out alive? Thrilling and kept me guessing! I loved the morally greyness of this group of friends! Lots of secrets, lies, mistrust, and betrayal in this one! Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon do an excellent job of keeping the twists coming right up until the very end!

[Deborah Zeman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you Quill Tree Books and Netgalley for the eARC!

Spring break was supposed to be a reset… not a body count. 😳🌴

Five friends. One tragedy they never got over. And a brand-new guy who fits into their group a little too perfectly…

When Anthony invites them to a private island getaway at his family’s luxury resort, it feels like the escape they’ve been desperate for. No drama. No memories. Just sun, ocean, and a fresh start.

Until the storm hits. ⛈️
And then… the bodies start showing up.

One by one, secrets they buried last year start washing ashore—lies, betrayals, and the truth about the friend they lost. And now? It’s happening again.

Trust no one.
Leave nothing buried.
Because this island? It remembers everything.

Who’s making it off alive… and who was never meant to? 👀🔪

Twists, turns, and surprises at every part of this story. LIke one of the characters says: "Nobody really knows anybody else because we are too busy trying to manage what other people think." Clayton/Jackson/Stone/Thomas/Woodfolk/Yoon knock it out of the park with this nonstop, heart pounding and sometimes "heart-wrenching" story of betrayal, deceit and oneupmanship. A very interesting cast of characters, compared to the characters in the two previous books by these amazing writers. The reader never knows who to truly trust. It's five, or six, if you count Ant, extremely unreliable narrators, who are so full of animosity against one another that they cannot see the trouble brewing right in front of their faces. If you like stories in the vein of One of Us Is Back, this one is for you!

[Alicia · Rating 3 out of 5]

To use the star power of each of the writers to create a teen thriller is no joke. The names are great contributors to the scene of YA literature. Blackout and Whiteout were a short story collection that told a full story while this definitely reads as one complete story where they assumed the roles of characters in the murder mystery on a private island. The problem is that it feels like all of the rest in this genre from the last handful of years. A vengeful person from the outskirts comes in and upends the world of a group of teens because tragedy seems to strike again and again. It's a complete suspension of disbelief in that sense, but it's a comfort in the genre. So I don't begrudge the hallmarks of the story.

A group of friends, six at the time from a private academy enjoy a vacation together. One dies. A year later they get to a private island and a resort a few months from actually being completed- invited as part of their new friend's insistence. Readers are introduced to the friends in a mult-POV, nonlinear timeline which also includes the secondary characters like the chef, the bellhop, etc. Fast forward after a natural disaster, a first death and ultimately by the end, multiple deaths. Rich kids with egos and connections, but someone hellbent on revenge. It works and there will be fans.

[Gina Malanga · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

I’m so bummed because I really love all of these authors and I have loved the last two books that they have done together as collaborations. However, those books very much felt like short stories that had characters in common as the overlap. Where is this really feels like one complete book. My main problem was that I could not keep track of who the people were, what time it was, past, present, on the island or off the island. Even when I was reading in large chunks to try to maintain some understanding, I had a really hard time following what was going on. They’re just seemed to be too many red herrings, and too many things thrown in to distract the reader that then it became hard to focus at all.

That being said, I did really like the concept of the story. These six friends get trapped on an island together during a hurricane, and all of them have secrets involving the death of their best friend the previous year. Not many of these people are likable and all of them are hiding something, but I couldn’t even stay focused on them because there was always new characters and new ideas being introduced. I will, of course, always ride hard for these authors, but this one was a little bit of a miss for me.

[Chloe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Actual rating: 3.5 stars

This book was super interesting and I was very invested. The idea of them being trapped on the island is what drew me in. I did predict one of the major plot twists but it did not affect how much I liked the book. I felt bad for Noelle most of the story and thought the other kids were absolute jerks.

I did feel like the multiple POVs (more than like 10) were unnecessary. Some I could see how they helped add to the storyline but the rest were completely unnecessary and made things more confusing.

Thank you to Quill Tree Books & NetGalley for an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Blu's Bookshelf · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really, really wanted to like Breakout. I love the authors and their personal writing styles. I hate to say that I think this book was drawn out.

I liked that there were multiple POVs, but I found some of them to be unnecessary and confusing. As I tried to keep up with the story, I got lost because of new characters being introduced. I feel like they took away from the storyline.

I enjoyed the concept of a group of teenagers trapped on an island, but I think the way it was done is a little lackluster.

[Samantha Sullivan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m confused!

I love so many of these authors so my hopes were high! I love the idea of “trapped somewhere and people dying and karma biting everyone in the ass” but this one fell a little flat for me :-/ I’m not super convinced by the ending and the story along the way dragged at times, but the writing was good and it picked up at the end!!

[mikeyandherbooks]

E-Arc provided by NetGalley

You could've told me this was written by one author and I would believe you - this didn't hold quite the same magic as Blackout & Whiteout for me. This was a interesting read and I wanted to find out what was going on but then the ending felt kind of rushed and it wasn't a very satisfying conclusion to the mystery.