It’s not every day that legends such as these get together to give us one of the books of the year. Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon have all become some of our favorite authors with their legendary books that include multiple bestsellers. And then they mesmerized us all with their work together on Blackout and Whiteout. Now they’re changing things up with their team up. Not only are they back together with another novel, but this time it’s a thriller that will no doubt absolutely leave you with chills.
Cosmopolitan has an exclusive look at Breakout by Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon, which is set to be released on June 2, 2026. Six students head off to a luxury resort of the ultimate vacation. That is until the weather and the secrets that they’ve been hiding start to derail everything. Suddenly, not only are they fighting for their survival, but they’re also fighting the very demons that they’ve been trying to hide in this heart-pounding thriller. Here’s some more info from our friends at Quill Tree Books:
Trapped at a luxurious resort off the coast of Florida, a group of elite teens are about to have a spring break they will never forget . . . but not all of them are coming home. The star-studded team of authors behind New York Times bestsellers Blackout and Whiteout returns with a thriller full of intrigue, betrayal, and heart-stopping romance.
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?
From the bestselling, award-winning team behind Blackout and Whiteout—Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon—comes a thriller that begs the question: is it possible to outrun the worst thing you've ever done?Murder-Mystery Meets Romance: Sparks fly and hearts collide over the course of one thrilling week. But can love survive when trust shatters and lives are on the line?
Forced Proximity: Trapped on a private island, this close-knit group of friends are about to stretch tensions to the snapping point. There is no escape from danger or desire!
Luxury With a Side of Lies: Be swept away by the glittering lifestyles of the one percent--and captivated by the intrigue and deadly secrets that lurk beneath their shimmering surfaces.
And you’re totally invited on this once-in-a-lifetime trip too! Check out an exclusive excerpt below! Just make sure to pre-order Breakout so you can find out what happens next when the book is released.
NOELLE CLARKE
April 6
2:16 p.m
A lie tasted delicious. A cherry ice pop on a hot day or a pumpkin-spiced latte as the weather cooled. There were as many flavors of lies as there were of the petit macarons in the glass windows of Noelle Clarke’s favorite patisserie in Georgetown. Some lies were savory, with bits of pistachios and matcha, the truth folded into the fabrication to make them more sincere. Some were even gory, like her father’s signature dish at Red Bone, his world-renowned restaurant: a luxurious beef bone, sliced open to reveal the decadent marrow inside, pomegranate reduction drizzled on top, like blood.
But the lie leaving Noelle’s mouth was thick and salty, like burnt caramel crystallized along the edges of an expensive saucepan.
“I didn’t do anything, you know?” she told the nurse who was slipping a blood pressure cuff around her bicep. “It wasn’t me.”
The red-faced woman didn’t glance up from her chart. “I’m just here to get your vitals, honey.”
“Then I can go home?” Noelle searched the woman’s face for the truth. Every person she’d encountered since leaving the boat was lying. The sweet kind of lies. And she knew it.
“Of course. You’ve all been through a trauma. We have to run tests to make sure you’re both physically and mentally okay. It’s just terrible what happened.”
Noelle didn’t need a reminder that the last few days had been awful—monstrous, in fact. She’d barely made it out. “But how long will it take?” Her front teeth nibbled her bottom lip until she got what she was after: blood. She felt bad about breaking the skin, but only a little bit. The nasty habit, as her mother called it, should’ve been “fixed” by now with all the expensive therapy appointments, stimming objects, and menthol-laced lip gloss her parents had invested in to deter the compulsion. But as the first metallic pearl oozed through the cut, throbbing with heat, Noelle was reminded that she was still alive. That she’d survived what had happened on that godforsaken island.
The nurse shook her head. “What did I tell you about doing that?” She handed Noelle a piece of gauze to apply pressure before wiping it with stinging antiseptic.
Noelle flinched as her skin sizzled. “I want to go home.” This was probably the hundredth time she’d said it.
“The officers will be back soon, and we need the results of your bloodwork and tests. Some of you were in such bad shape . . .” The nurse’s statement had a question underneath: How did you get hurt like this?
The machine beeped. They watched together as Noelle’s heart rate spiked. She didn’t know how to respond. She didn’t know where to begin. She didn’t know if she even wanted to.
So she avoided eye contact, instead surveying the small hospital room again, counting each item like she did when she’d prepare to bake one of her award-winning creations. (She’d won the Washington, DC, Capital City Junior Bake-Off Championship two years in a row.) She’d assess each ingredient, making a mental inventory of what she was working with. In this current reality: a tiny bathroom with a leaky faucet she could hear when the room got too quiet; one wobbly chair; a hospital bed that she reluctantly occupied; a single window overlooking the Atlantic Ocean (a body of water she never wanted to see again if she could help it); and one door leading to a hall clogged with police officers, detectives, and security. Aka her only exit led right to the people who wanted to keep her here.
The machine beeped again, and the blood pressure cuff pulled her focus back to the nurse. The woman’s blue gaze was fixed on Noelle’s injuries with curiosity. Noelle wondered if she could see deeper, beyond the cuts and bruises, down to her heart, where the real damage lay. Noelle knew if she caught a glimpse of herself in the small wall mirror, she’d see just how terrible she looked. Her brown skin boasted a constellation of bruises. The whites of her eyes were streaked with red. Dried blood crusted in the stitches holding the gash in her chin shut. And her twists had unraveled, releasing her thick curls: a lion’s mane dirtied with sand, salt, and seaweed.
“Your blood pressure is higher than it should be,” the nurse reported. “You need to rest and try to stay calm.” She rubbed Noelle’s shoulder. “I may need to add something to your IV to help.”
Noelle bit her bottom lip again, the weak, half-formed scab easily giving in to her anxieties. “They’re going to lie about me,” she said as fresh blood hit her tongue. “They always do.”
The nurse’s eyebrows lifted. “Who?”
Noelle glared out the window. “My friends.”
“Well, if they’re good friends, they won’t.”
Noelle gritted her teeth. “You don’t know them. They’re—” The door swung open. A man entered, a gun at his hip, and a streak of sunburn on his white nose noticeable against his all-black clothes. “Are you ready to talk now?”
“I’ll be back to check on you later.” The nurse patted Noelle’s leg, then nodded at the detective and left the room.
Noelle stared forward, eyes fixed on bursts of lightning illuminating dark storm clouds rolling in over the ocean. A week ago, she would’ve been in awe of the view.
The detective dragged the chair closer to the bed, and the screech of the legs set her nerves on edge. “I’m Detective Franco. We can start at the beginning.”
Noelle crossed her arms and refused to look at him. “I don’t have anything to say.”
“Oh, that can’t be true. Not when each of your friends called you the ringleader.” He tapped his notepad.
Noelle squirmed, fixating on the storm outside. It grew closer and closer by the minute. “Yeah, okay . . .”
He flipped the pages and read. “They said you control everything. That you run the crew . . . the Six, is it?” He gazed up, and Noelle felt his eyes burning into her. “Oh, and Keisha White was your best friend?”
“Keisha White is dead,” Noelle replied matter-of-factly, willing her mind not to summon images of Key’s dead face. The bulge of her pretty heterochromic eyes, one blue and one green. The blue tinge in her full lips. The graying of her light brown skin.
“She died last year around this time, right? Very sad. Heartbreaking for everyone involved, I’m sure. Very sorry for your loss.” Noelle gulped down the lump in her throat. “I don’t want to talk about her.”
“Maybe you’ll want to talk about Anthony Brooks, then?”
A shiver raced across Noelle’s skin. She shoved her hands beneath her thighs to keep them from trembling and forced herself to meet his eyes this time. “Like I told you before, I didn’t do anything. I don’t know anything.” She looked away. “I want to talk to my parents.”
“They’re on their way now that those twin hurricanes have passed. Boarded a plane from Washington, DC, thirty minutes ago. In the meantime, we need some answers.” The man clicked his pen. “Anthony was your boyfriend, yes?”
Tears welled in her eyes despite her attempts to fight them. “Yes,” she muttered. “Mm-hmm . . .” Noelle didn’t know what he was scribbling, but it made her neck itch.
“So, what happened on the island, Noelle?” he pressed.
She clenched her jaw.
“The Six—your crew—all of them said you were to blame. That you did this.” Noelle’s head snapped up, her breaking point reached. “They’re fucking lying!” she screamed. “They’re terrible people, all of them! They’ll never tell you what really happened!”
She pulled her knees to her chest and rocked back and forth, willing her pulse to slow, but it galloped. As the man asked more questions, her ears filled with the beeping of machines and the slamming of doors and the crashing of thunder outside.
The storm inside Noelle raged, mirroring the one through the window. People always said they wanted to know the truth. They told lies about how revealing your secrets would set you free. But what happened when the truth was ugly? No one actually wanted to know how a person’s neck snapped like a twig or how their lungs filled with water or how they choked to death. No one wanted the details of what it was like to watch the light leave a person’s eyes.
At seventeen, Noelle understood that humans preferred their truth sweetened and softened with lies like brown sugar melted into butter. So she would bake the most beautiful lies.
She had no choice.
Breakout Copyright © 2026 by Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angela Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon.
Breakout, by Dhonielle Clayton, Tiffany D. Jackson, Nic Stone, Angie Thomas, Ashley Woodfolk, and Nicola Yoon will be released on June 2, 2026 from Quill Tree Books. To preorder the book, click on the retailer of your choice:
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