The Reckless Club

Written by Beth Vrabel

Five kids face unexpected bonds and revelations during a day of punishment at a retirement home.

3.8/5 Goodreads · 219 ratings

256 pages· 57,459 words· Est. 8 hour read

$16.99Save 6%

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Bookroo's summary

On their last day of middle school, five misfit kids pull pranks, thinking they'll escape trouble. Instead, they're sentenced to a day at Northbrook Retirement Home. As they serve meals and entertain residents, they uncover secrets about themselves and each other. Will this day of punishment forge unexpected friendships and change their paths forever? Each hour reveals new truths and challenges, pushing them to confront who they are and who they want to become.

From the publisher

From award-winning author Beth Vrabel comes a new middle-grade Breakfast Club drama set in a old folks’ home. On the last day of middle school, five kids who couldn’t be more different commit separate pranks, each sure they won’t be caught and they can’t get in trouble. They’re wrong. As punishment, they each have to volunteer one beautiful summer day-the last one before school-at Northbrook Retirement and Assisted Living Home, where they’ll push creamed carrots into toothless mouths, perform the world’s most pathetic skit in front of residents who won’t remember it anyway, hold gnarled hands of peach fuzzed old ladies who relentlessly push hard candies, and somehow forge a bond with each other that has nothing to do with what they’ve done and everything to do with who they’re becoming. All the action takes place in the course of this one day, with each chapter one hour of that day, as the five kids reveal what they’ve done, why they did it, and what they’re going to do now.

At a glance

Format: Hardcover
Pages: 256
Words: 57,459
Reading age: 8–12
Audience: Middle Grade
Lexile: 650L

Themes & topics

Books about bullying Books about aging Books about death Books about coping with death Books about bereavement

Good to know

Stories behind the story

Where did you originally get the idea for The Reckless Club?

As a child of the eighties, I've watched copious amounts of "The Breakfast Club" movie. I loved the idea that five kids, all wildly different than each other, could spend just a few hours together and realize they are so much more than the labels they've been assigned. Instead of serving detention in a school library, "The Reckless Club" characters are forced to spend the day volunteering in a nursing home, discovering connections to each other and their parallel in the home's community.

What part of creating The Reckless Club did you most enjoy?

I pushed myself to really embrace the out-of-comfort-zone experience that my characters go through in the book. So instead of my usual first person, past tense approach, "The Reckless Club" is told in third person, present tense as the day unfolds.