It’s hard not to think about Jeffrey Epstein and his co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell while reading Alex Marwood’s latest thriller, The Island of Lost Girls. Like Epstein, Matthew Meade is wealthy and has a woman like Maxwell, in this case his daughter, Tatiana, to find and groom young girls to be sexually abused by rich, well known men. Meade’s stomping ground is a Mediterranean island, La Kastellana that is remote and has a twisty history that still dictates the bizarre and often violent behavior of the upper and lower class residents. Epstein owned Little St. James Island, in the U.S. Virgin Islands which he turned into a playground for his sex games. Both Meade and Epstein loved boats and surrounded themselves with princes, actors, corporate big wigs, and politicians.
Alex Marwood (Photo Credit: Sarah Wills-Hazarika)
Marwood’s novel skips between two periods, 1985-1986 and 2015-2016. Like Maxwell, Tatiana and her associate, Julia Beech, troll for vulnerable girls and lure them in with the promise of a glamorous life filled with travel, beautiful clothes, and the opportunity to meet influential men who can help their careers, either as models or actresses. Gemma, only 15, is ripe for picking. Her parents went through an acrimonious divorce and Gemma has become a target for their anger and disapproval. Looking to escape her unhappy life, she jumps at the chance to becomes one of Julia’s “clients.” The gig starts out on a positive note. While in London, she enjoys going to parties and bonds with some of the other young women in Julia’s stable. Landing on La Kastellana she realizes she’s really a prostitute with the sex games becoming more dangerous.
Gemma’s mother, Robin, regrets how she treated her daughter and wages a year-long campaign to find her. After discovering that Gemma told her friends she was leaving for La Kastellana, Robin travels there but makes little progress with local law enforcement. Because Gemma said she was invited to a posh party on the island, Robin crashes one of Meade’s events, only to result in threats from the police.
Locals have long known that the Meades are evil and cutthroat. But since they enjoy the protection of the duke, part of La Kastellana’s ruling family, and control most of the business on the island, there is no authority to check their influence. The Delia family, who run a small restaurant, suffer the most from the Meade’s control. A chance meeting on the beach between a 12 year-old Mercedes Delia and the 13 year-old Tatiana, results in a contract that will bind Mercedes to the Meade family for years. Tatiana convinces her father to “buy” Mercedes as her companion. Eager for the money, Mercedes’ father agrees. While Tatiana opens Mercedes eyes to another life, dealing with the erratic heiress is humiliating and exhausting. And when an adult Mercedes realizes what Tatiana and her father and up to, she knows she must stop them.
The media was filled with the disturbing stories of the abuse suffered by the young women Epstein and Maxwell recruited. Marwell takes the reader inside some of these horrific encounters, albeit fictional encounters, sparing the reader from any graphic details. It’s the aftermath that becomes hard hitting, listening to the young women after a night of what can only be described as assault, and the cavalier attitude by Tatiana as she serves them brandies.
In the end, like Epstein, Meade pays for his sins, although what will happen to Tatiana, as well as all the men who participated in these orgies (like Epstein’s victims, they were taped, too), is left to our imagination.
The Island of Lost Girls
Alex Marwood
Top photo: Bigstock
