Only If You're Lucky

In the US, a college or university education is considered mandatory for many high school students. The process of selecting a college is critical to determining a fundamentally formative part of the transition from adolescence to adulthood, and the transition from living at home with parents to living on a college campus is often compared to moving to a foreign country. Prior to college, most people experience a hierarchy of influence in their lives that centers on family, with secondary influence from figures of authority and friend groups. However, in college, this balance shifts in favor of peer and friend group influence because the student is separated physically from the direct influence of family members. Many students undergo a shift in identity, often described as finding oneself, in the college environment while navigating the competing influences of professors, friends, peers, and mentors and the distant influence of family. Only If You’re Lucky centers on such a transition for Margot and her friends, and critical components of college life are necessary to understand Margot’s journey.

The dominance of influence from peer networks and friend groups in college derives from the close proximity of students to one another and from the social groups they form for comfort and support. Students in college are suddenly responsible for their own actions, such as maintaining good grades, sustaining themselves through exercise and diet, and considering decisions that will influence their lives later. Friend groups and peer networks are one way to cope with the pressure of these responsibilities, and as shown in the novel, they aren’t always beneficial. For Margot, this support comes from three friends: Lucy, Sloane, and Nicole. In addition, they interact with another peer network common in the college environment: fraternities. These groups provide emotional support but also present challenges, such as peer pressure to use drugs and alcohol, engage in sexual activity, and push the boundaries of acceptable behavior. In the novel, these pressures result in heavy drug use, sexual assault, and even murder, reflecting the dangerous elements of college culture in the US.

The novel takes place near a fraternity house, the off-campus equivalent of a dormitory for members of a fraternity, and the subculture of fraternity life is a crucial component to understanding the story. A fraternity is a social organization specifically for men, while their sister equivalent for women is a sorority (terms deriving from Latin words meaning “Greek life”). Both are associated with a house where accepted members live, and both operate as a kind of secret society in which rituals and traditions pass down from one class to the next. Prospective members “rush” a fraternity to become “pledges,” a process that the novel depicts through characters like Levi and Danny. The overarching premise of a fraternity is to provide social and educational support for members, as well as networking opportunities for careers after college. However, fraternities (and sometimes sororities) are often criticized for perpetuating the practice of “hazing,” which often forces pledges into dangerous situations in which they must commit or endure violence or abusive acts. Within fraternity culture specifically, the emphasis on masculinity and separation of gender develops a prevalence of toxic masculine traits, excessive drug and alcohol use, and a culture that promotes and defends sexual assault and sexual violence.