"The three of us hadn't been together in real life since that first summer." Colleen McKeegan's highly anticipated debut novel, The Wild One, opens with a reunion no one wants. Amanda hasn't spoken a word about her secret or her nostalgic summers at Camp Catalpa in over a decade. But now she's slipping up, and the only people she can count on are her fellow campers, girls who have sworn never to speak out: Katherine and Meg.

Described by Harper Collins as a "dark and twisted coming-of-age thriller," The Wild One has already garnered praise from bestselling authors Megan Abbott and Joe Piazza. Abbott describes it as "a story of secrets, shame, and painful reckoning." The manuscript has been making waves for some time since it was acquired for a six-figure sum in 2020. McKeegan is a former senior features editor at Marie Claire and has worked for Bloomberg and Fortune magazine.

The three of us had not been together in real life since that first summer. That was intentional, at least for me. I did not want to talk about what brought us together, what we had sworn as girls not to tell anyone. The police told me that alcohol abuse had caused the seizures that led to the fall and his death. It is not our family or friends, or the expensive lawyer my parents hired to represent me and Catherine, or the one Meg's aunt hired to represent her. Everyone did because it was easy to dismiss a man like him. They were not wrong, not exactly, but they missed some important details. Especially the trigger, which Catherine took care of for me. We knew very little about Meg, and Catherine should have prayed for my demise after what I had done to her. But we all shared the burden of silence because we all played a part in the events of that summer. For years, only the three of us knew that it was I who had killed him. And now I was back in the same forest where the incident began, helpless once again under the towering oaks, elms and pines. They, too, are whispering to each other, as if they, too, want to unleash the truth.

It was Meg's idea to meet here. She is still a local, working as a waitress at a casino resort about 20 miles away. Although much of this place is a wasteland, the slots still draw a regular stream of tourists, and Meg's income with them. Last week we spoke on the phone. It was our first and last phone call, and our voices were both strange and familiar at the same time. Catherine and I are both graduate students, she in Boston and I in New York, so we agreed: we road trip to the Poconos, the place where he died. Funerals in our past, Meg said in a muffled voice on the other end of the phone.

I wasn't quite sure what to bring to a funeral that must have happened over a decade ago. I shoved a fifth of vodka and a few cans of Diet Coke into my tote bag in case things were likely to get awkward. When I changed in my air-conditioned bedroom that morning, my black sleeveless maxi dress seemed like appropriate attire. Sweat trickled down my spine and pooled where my skin met my underwear, reminding me that the shade of this particular forest did not protect me. I unfolded the blanket, the fleece blanket I had huddled under as a child hours after watching his head crack open. In one corner, a faded tag was taped to it, reading Amanda Brooks. At the time, I told myself that the blanket had belonged to my mother and that I was keeping it because it was a hand-me-down from one of her camping trips. The early June sky is as merciless as it was in 2003, and in this light I fear that the blanket is a trophy, a distorted memento that is a constant reminder of the evil that lurks beneath the exterior I have painstakingly polished. I throw the blanket messily to the forest floor and wait cross-legged, rocks and sticks thrusting their jagged shapes into my tailbone. We have kept our secret for over a decade. And until we learned why we had promised never to speak of it. Then one mysterious email arrived and our friendship was rekindled.

My phone rings, and another barrage of texts from Jackson.

I need to talk to you.

Why won't you answer me?

I blanked out the screen. My stomach had done somersaults before when I saw his name plastered on my phone. His arms wrapped around me, his fingers overlapping mine. Flashes of our time together. Memories I never wanted to forget. Unlike what happened in this forest. The promises I made to Catherine and Meg that I broke and shared with him. Now, his emails make me soar. Each vibration is a shrieking warning to calm the chaos I have unleashed. Me.

That's why I'm here. Hoping that Catherine and Meg will once again help me clean up the mess I made. I twirl the oversized pearl in my left ear in my earring. I knew the pearl earring would give me a sense of control. As the minutes click by, I become more and more unsure if Meg and Catherine will show up or if this crazy reunion I've triggered will actually happen. Our past is a steel chain that binds us and has no bolts to cut. Will it be enough, or will the fear of our combined forces, the dangerous force we can become when the material is just right, keep them away?

I looked up and was surprised that the leafy rooftops were not a permanent shade of crimson. But like my memories, the blood fades with time.

"The Wild One" was released on June 14, 2022.