Book: Pretty Ruthless by Lexi Davis
Reviewed by Jill's Twisted Spicy Reads
Rating: 5/5
Pretty Ruthless takes us back to 1994 and reveals the dark beginnings of The Order through Becky Dawson and Carrson Ashford.
Becky arrives at Ashford University searching for answers about her sister Remi’s death. She doesn’t have wealth, influence, or a powerful family name, but she refuses to be intimidated by the students who control everything behind closed doors. Every clue eventually leads her to Carrson Ashford.
Carrson is cold, controlled, and deeply embedded in a world built on manipulation, blood oaths, violence, and inherited power. He warns Becky to stay away, but she continues watching him, following him, and challenging him. Their relationship quickly becomes a dangerous battle between two people who recognize the darkness inside each other.
What stood out to me was how Becky’s investigation slowly changed her. She begins as an outsider trying to expose The Order, but the closer she gets to Carrson, the more blurred the line becomes between uncovering the society and becoming part of it.
Becky and Carrson’s connection isn’t soft or healing. It is obsessive, unsettling, tender in unexpected moments, and destructive in others. Their shared trauma creates a bond neither of them can easily escape.
This prequel adds so much history to The Order while showing how its traditions, secrets, and cycles of violence were passed down through generations. It can be read as a standalone, but readers of Pretty Vicious will recognize the foundations of the dangerous legacy that follows.
Dark, atmospheric, and filled with morally gray choices, Pretty Ruthless explores what happens when grief and ambition turn outsiders into the architects of the very system they once despised.