Name: Air's review of Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll
Item: Bright Young Women
Rating: 4
Author: Air

Jessica Knoll

From the author of the New York Times bestseller and #1 Netflix movie Luckiest Girl Alive comes an extraordinary novel inspired by the real-life sorority targeted by America's first celebrity serial killer in his final murderous spree. January 1978. A serial killer has terrorized women across the Pacific Northwest, but his existence couldn’t be further from the minds of the vibrant young women at the top sorority on Florida State University’s campus in Tallahassee. Tonight is a night of promise, excitement, and desire, but Pamela Schumacher, president of the sorority, makes the unpopular decision to stay home—a decision that unwittingly saves her life. Startled awake at 3 a.m. by a strange sound, she makes the fateful decision to investigate. What she finds behind the door is a scene of implausible violence—two of her sisters dead; two others, maimed. Over the next few days, Pamela is thrust into a terrifying mystery inspired by the crime that’s captivated public interest for more than four decades. On the other side of the country, Tina Cannon has found peace in Seattle after years of hardship. A chance encounter brings twenty-five-year-old Ruth Wachowsky into her life, a young woman with painful secrets of her own, and the two form an instant connection. When Ruth goes missing from Lake Sammamish State Park in broad daylight, surrounded by thousands of beachgoers on a beautiful summer day, Tina devotes herself to finding out what happened to her. When she hears about the tragedy in Tallahassee, she knows it’s the man the papers refer to as the All-American Sex Killer. Determined to make him answer for what he did to Ruth, she travels to Florida on a collision course with Pamela—and one last impending tragedy. Bright Young Women is the story about two women from opposite sides of the country who become sisters in their fervent pursuit of the truth. It proposes a new narrative inspired by evidence that’s been glossed over for decades in favor of more salable headlines—that the so-called brilliant and charismatic serial killer from Seattle was far more average than the countless books, movies, and primetime specials have led us to believe, and that it was the women whose lives he cut short who were the exceptional ones.

A Novel

Bright Young Women

clara

"I'd like to propose that anger in women is treated as a character disorder, as a problem to be solved, when oftentimes it is entirely appropriate, given the circumstances that trigger it.”

Jillian Roberts

"I don't think you're delusional at all" I said to Shirley. "I think you would much rather everyone believe your daughter ran away. Because if her name is connected to all this, people might start digging. And they might find out that she was living her life in a way that you find shameful. So you would rather never know what happened to her, or learn where your own daughter is buried, than risk people finding out that she wasn't 'perfect' What kind of mother is that?"

Melanie Harvie

Women got that feeling about him, the funny one we all get when we know something isn’t right, but we don’t know how to politely extricate ourselves from the situation without escalating the threat of violence or harassment. That is not a skill women are taught, the same way men are not taught that it is okay to leave a woman alone if what she wants is to be left alone. 

Lindsay

Things grow differently when they’re damaged, showing us how to occupy strange new ground to bloom red instead of green. We can be found, brighter than before.

Old souls are just people who had to fend for themselves ahead of their time.

Though we were technically in the golden era of the American serial killer, that would have been news to most of us in 1978. The term had been coined earlier in the decade, but serial killer was not yet part of our colloquial true- crime- junkie parlance. There have always been serial killers— in the sixteenth century, they were put on trial as werewolves. There are women serial killers who amass their victims by manipulating others to do their dirty work, and Black serial killers whom we rarely hear about not because they are Black but because their victims are. After a boom of buzzy, media- driven notoriety for The Defendant, the Night Stalker, the Hillside Strangler, and the Golden State Killer, there was enough awareness around the idea that a deranged killer could be masquerading as the friendly usher at your church that anyone imprinted with that dark pathology was forced to tap into a different victim pool in order to keep hunting without getting caught. We don’t hear about serial killers much anymore because they target sex workers, people who get into a stranger’s car as a means of survival and whose disappearances are less likely to raise alarm bells.

Denise and all the others in Washington, Utah, and Colorado just so happened to be part of a particular victim pool, at a particular moment of comprehension in the field of criminal and social sciences, at a particular moment of media interest. But that flashpoint in history, as most flashpoints tend to be, is detectable only now, with the benefit of hindsight.

realizing you have two choices in life. You either wake up to someone’s fusty kiss or you wake up alone. Pick your poison.

Women got that feeling about him, that funny one we all get when we know something isn’t right, but we don’t know how to politely extricate ourselves from the situation without escalating the threat of violence or harassment. That is not a skill women are taught, the same way men are not taught that it is okay to leave a woman alone if what she wants is to be left alone.

That the call to stay at home for three- quarters of the day coincided with the height of the women’s lib movement in downtown Seattle did not seem to me like any coincidence.

Tina had this way of staring at you while you spoke, like she wasn’t at all listening to what you were saying and instead was trying to figure out what you weren’t saying. It had to have been why every woman who spoke to her came away with cheeks flaming, feeling unbelievably exposed.

“Tina brings up a good point,” Frances said, giving the injured woman a name and such a smile that it was instantly clear Tina was her favorite. “Which is that members of our support team don’t need to understand every dark corner of our grief in order to provide us support.”

No one tells you that the truest stories are the messy, unwieldy ones, that you will be tempted to trim in the places that make people scratch their heads and pad the parts where they lean in closer. It takes fortitude to remain a true and constant witness, and I did.

“They will call you hysterical no matter how much dignity you have. So you might as well do whatever the hell you want.”

“A black swan event is a highly improbable event but also one that, upon closer examination, was predictable. The sinking of the Titanic is an example of one; so is World War One. These are outcomes that are referred to as outliers on an economist’s model.”

We had been performing the same dance all our lives— one in which I asked for little and received even less— but that was the moment I changed the steps on her. She never quite caught up, but she did try.

There were men who cracked their knuckles while divulging to me what they would do to The Defendant if they got the chance, thinking this was somehow reassuring for me to hear. But all it did was make me realize that there wasn’t so big a difference between the man who’d brutalized Denise and half the men I passed every day on the street.

Sometimes, when I get an unfavorable outcome in court, when I start thinking justice may be a fallacy after all, I remember that Salvador Dalí died six hours before Denise’s killer went to the electric chair. January 23, 1989: look it up. The passing of one of the world’s most celebrated and eccentric artists ensured that the execution of some lowlife in Central Florida was not the top news story of the day, and he would have dead- man- walked to the execution chamber bereft over that. More than his own freedom, more than the chance to make me sorry for what I did to him, what he wanted was a spectacle. On these bad days, I like to think that Denise is up there, wherever it is truly smashing women go when they die, and that she’d managed to pull a few strings. Overshadowed his death the way he did her fleeting time on this earth.

There were and continue to be plenty of disparities between fraternity and sorority living, but the big one that the chapter president at the time was always going on about was the level at which Greek alumni gave back to their organizations. Fraternity men had, for generations, gone on to become more economically sound than sorority women, and by and large their houses boasted newer furniture, top- of- the- line air- conditioning units,

On a scale of 1-10 I am 9 pissed off I was scammed into reading a Ted Bundy book even if it never says his name. We all know the details. And I don’t think it’s actually a feminist or particularly restorative re-telling just because it focuses on women in the story instead.. because it still just seems like a story that keeps saying “aren’t these men awful, isn’t this time period awful, wasn’t this society awful” instead of “here are these complete human beings and then this thing happened to them.” It still revolves entirely around this axis, and for all the supposed story I don’t feel like I know any of these women at all—I just feel mad for them. 

anyways I am 80% done so I will finish it but I should have read the reviews to better understand that it wasn’t just a loose fictionalisation based on what happened but like a historical re-imagination of the actual for real story of Bundy which I would rather have had dental surgery than spend any time reading about ever again. Everything I know about this man has been against my will and even without saying his name, this book added to that and for me that is unforgivable.

Apiecalypse Jen

Another book that I had recommended 20 times and has so many great reviews and I am like 2/3 of the way through and waiting for this to actually be interesting in any way… 

Abby Brake

Overall, good thriller with some sapphic/queer moments. There were moments that I felt the writing was a bit pretentious (maybe that’s due to me being a law student and how they handle the legal world). 

Plus, having a strong female protagonist that self proclaims being annoying/abrasive to others because she’s strong and smart just…I get the point but when do we cross into too much?  

Overall, good thriller with some sapphic/queer moments. There were moments that I felt the writing was a bit pretentious (maybe that’s due to me being a law student and how they handle the legal world). 

Plus, having a strong female protagonist that self proclaims being annoying/abrasive to others because she’s strong and smart just…I get the point but when do we cross into too much?  

A story about women for women. The 1970’s is often called the serial killer’s day in America but what is forgotten in this story? Their victims, so often women are left out of the story in thanks to the notoriety of their killers. By taking away the killers name you give them back their story, and while this book is fiction it is based off true events and true stories that have been forgotten in the story of the killer 

Abbi Brown 

i liked this take on the ted bundy murders. but i feel like this was kinda weird at times idk 

taylor

This is a very heavy hitting book. Check your triggers. Sutton is the narrator and I’d pretty much pay to hear her narrate the McDonald’s menu. 

4.25. This was both great and also infuriating, as it was meant to be. The title alone is a jab at the sexism in the justice system (I mean everywhere) and the contents will leave you pissed off but I very much appreciate this alternative look into the story this was inspired by in comparison to they way most documentaries choose to portray it. I also very much enjoyed her writing style and while it didn’t have me completely gripped and unable to out it down, this was a great book. I don’t normally enjoy true or fictional crime books, so this is lot coming from me. 

Laura Wilson

I think this was an interesting story. I'm going to be honest; I didn't know The Defendant was Ted Bundy until the end of the book. I might have found it more interesting if I had known from the start. Although I liked the concept, I felt like the writing in this book was hard to follow. I found myself having to reread passages a lot, and sometimes still not quite understanding what they were trying to convey. This was labeled as a thriller, but I didn't think it fit that genre. 

Maggie Hotmer

Grace Edwards

The writing wasn’t for me and the characters didn’t seem like real people. Interesting concept and I like that it attempted to center the victims, but I’m not sure it worked.

still have some questions, it has a very nonlinear plot but i thoroughly enjoyed its focus on women re: male serial killers that target women

Nina

Chit

obsession with crime and all these serial killer cases also stems from a detachment from the humanity (in those whose lives were taken, the people who loved them etc) & i think this was a brilliant way of storytelling to bring some of that back into light and also delve into some of the more nuanced/complex attitudes about women and victims and crimes of a sexual nature and how things can be considered sexual just because you are a woman. it’s terrifying to think about because it took so long for a resolution, because you [girls] are expected to carry on unless you want to look weak, because you don’t want to let The Defendant win. because how much can really change in 50 years? 

karina

         Like every other middle aged suburban wife and mother, I love serial killers.  I am so stereotypical it’s sometimes comical.  I drink wine, I love book club, I exclusively wear pants with an elastic waistband, and I have an absurd collection of vacuum-sealed tumblers but use one more than the others.  I love mass-market paperback romance novels, but read other genres so I can seem like I’m worldly (just kidding, I love other genres as well.  I read everything).  I haven’t embraced brunch yet, but I’m sure that’s on the horizon.  So yeah, of course I’m into serial killers, which means this book was high on my anticipated releases. 

            This one tells a story of perhaps one of the most famous American serial killers, but from the perspective of one of his victims and a few bystanders.  I was intrigued by the potential of this retelling of the happenings surrounding this particular monster’s tale.  We know the story from the lawyers involved with his Florida trial, we know the story from the police in Aspen.  We know the story from various ancillary characters in Utah and Washington.  What we didn’t know was how the people that got left behind felt.  I wanted so badly to love this book, but I really didn’t love this book.

            I felt like this book meandered far too much.  There was a lot of focus on the running of a sorority and the politics of a major university.  There was a lot of focus on these women’s relationships with their own families, and it didn’t feel like it really had anything to do with the basic story of the effects of the serial killer.  There was a HUGE element of victim-blaming that I didn’t enjoy.  While I realize that there was a lot of truth to victim blaming at the time, I just felt like it lessened the impact of the message of survival these women should have been conveying. 

            So, yet again, I’m disappointed with a book.  Either my expectations are too high, or the books just aren’t that good.  No worries, I’m going to keep reading. 

Kristen Claiborn

         Like every other middle aged suburban wife and mother, I love serial killers.  I am so stereotypical it’s sometimes comical.  I drink wine, I love book club, I exclusively wear pants with an elastic waistband, and I have an absurd collection of vacuum-sealed tumblers but use one more than the others.  I love mass-market paperback romance novels, but read other genres so I can seem like I’m worldly (just kidding, I love other genres as well.  I read everything).  I haven’t embraced brunch yet, but I’m sure that’s on the horizon.  So yeah, of course I’m into serial killers, which means this book was high on my anticipated releases. 

            This one tells a story of perhaps one of the most famous American serial killers, but from the perspective of one of his victims and a few bystanders.  I was intrigued by the potential of this retelling of the happenings surrounding this particular monster’s tale.  We know the story from the lawyers involved with his Florida trial, we know the story from the police in Aspen.  We know the story from various ancillary characters in Utah and Washington.  What we didn’t know was how the people that got left behind felt.  I wanted so badly to love this book, but I really didn’t love this book.

            I felt like this book meandered far too much.  There was a lot of focus on the running of a sorority and the politics of a major university.  There was a lot of focus on these women’s relationships with their own families, and it didn’t feel like it really had anything to do with the basic story of the effects of the serial killer.  There was a HUGE element of victim-blaming that I didn’t enjoy.  While I realize that there was a lot of truth to victim blaming at the time, I just felt like it lessened the impact of the message of survival these women should have been conveying. 

            So, yet again, I’m disappointed with a book.  Either my expectations are too high, or the books just aren’t that good.  No worries, I’m going to keep reading. 

There were multiple times where I said to myself, “I know this story” or “I know this name.” Turns out I wasn’t crazy. This is a great book from the perspective of this

There were multiple times where I said to myself, “I know this story” or “I know this name.” Turns out I wasn’t crazy. This is a great book from the perspective of this real-life serial killer’s fictionalized victims. 

Was it about a year ago that I read "Notes on an Execution" and was severely disappointed? I cannot help but feel that "Bright Young Women" was the book I was looking for instead. 

This novel truly takes the steps necessary to put focus on the victims of gruesome murders and the impact this has on the lives of the people closest to them, especially the women in their proximity. It also makes the deliberate choice to highlight that serial killers, no matter how future narratives would try to frame them, are not some charismatic intelligent men but rather narcissitic sadists, allowed to believe their own myth way too much. Knoll manages to channel the anger and outrage towards such depictions excellently through the main characters' consistent fight to bring the killer ( deliberately referred to within the novel only as "the defendant") to justice.

The novel can come off as a little hamfisted at times but since subtlety does not seem to work for some people, at least this gets the point across.

Was it about a year ago that I read "Notes on an Execution" and was severely disappointed? I cannot help but feel that "Bright Young Women" was the book I was looking for instead. 

This novel truly takes the steps necessary to put focus on the victims of gruesome murders and the impact this has on the lives of the people closest to them, especially the women in their proximity. It also makes the deliberate choice to highlight that serial killers, no matter how future narratives would try to frame them, are not some charismatic intelligent men but rather narcissitic sadists, allowed to believe their own myth way too much. Knoll manages to channel the anger and outrage towards such depictions excellently through the main characters' consistent fight to bring the killer ( deliberately referred to within the novel only as "the defendant") to justice.

The novel can come off as a little hamfisted at times but since subtlety does not seem to work for some people, at least this gets the point across.

Pretty thoughtful and had a lot to say. Pamela's friendship with Tina was well depicted and interesting, but I would have appreciated more between Ruth and Tina. Pamela's tidy, fussy, empathetic, and keen eyed personality was exactly what we needed in this story. About the various frustrating roadblocks and diminishments women face when trying to navigate the justice system, when they're the ones harmed. Don't look for a murder mystery. This is something else entirely and it was pretty good

Boothby

Fiercely feminist, a story on the victims of the Defendant that shows the hidden corruption and failure of the justice system when it comes to serial killers who are touted as savants when all they are is insecure and insolent . 

Kate B-L

This historical true crime fiction is in the same vein as Emma Cline’s The Girls (about the Mansons) and Beautiful Revolutionary (about Jonestown) but this follows the storyline of the FSU women attacked by Ted Bundy. Audiobook was great for this as it switched between timelines and characters very clearly with different narration! 

Kyra Cracchiola

Jessica Knoll is perfect. Her writing is exquisite. This book was not my usually style but I ate it up. This hit on so many good topics in the world of women. The issues she hits on while also creating this story was so well done. It made me THINK. This was such a fantastic take on true crime. “The defendant” was the best part of the entire book. That simple phrase was enough to make my praise her. The lack of acknowledgement towards someone who is often romanticized despite his horrific crimes was brilliant. She didnt even allow him the simplest of acknowledgment by calling him by name. She’s a genius I’ve determined. 

Tatum cain 

Imagine writing a whole section about how people made a Ted Bundy Netflix show and keep making things about him, and how that’s so unnecessary and ridiculous because he isn’t worth it 

I would have much rather read a book about Denise. She sounds so interesting. The rest of this book was just a lot of information about a dude I have gone out of my way to not know things about. Everything I know about Ted Bundy has been against my will and this book has been the biggest chunk of information. Every woman in this book is having a horrible time the entire time. Even though they never say his name it’s so clearly and obviously him that I wondered what the point of dancing around it even was, surely not to keep survivors like me from being irritated about this story still somehow being centered on his actions. 

I was desperate for someone to have something positive or uplifting happen. It’s a fictionalisation and this was what was fictionalised? You couldn’t have fictionalised a couple of women who were happy or had righteous fury? 

I also just wondered what the point of the relentless “everyone was awful. Everything that happened was awful. What an awful time” vibe was. Did we learn anything? No shit cops are useless. The justice system is misogynistic. There are such a thing as women who perpetuate misogyny as a coping mechanism. Abusers usually come from abuse. People don’t believe women. This came out in 2023… was this a big reveal for anyone?

And to just be super extra clear here, I absolutely did not want to read a Ted Bundy book. I don’t think that by telling the story through the eyes of women adjacent to his victims it becomes not a Ted Bundy book. I now without seeking any of it out know more things about Ted Bundy, and nothing truthful that I can say definitively about the women since their story was “fictionalised” so I am irritated and it wasn’t for me and I didn’t vibe at all. 

PLEASE STOP TALKING/WRITING/MAKING THINGS ABOUT THIS LOSER OF A DUDE, directly or indirectly, subversive or not, just stop making fucking Bundy stuff. No one’s Bundy thing is special. I need to stop hearing about this man or I will start a very large fire somewhere and walk away thank you.

Imagine writing a whole section about how people made a Ted Bundy Netflix show and keep making things about him, and how that’s so unnecessary and ridiculous because he isn’t worth it in your Ted Bundy book.

I would have much rather read a book about Denise. She sounds so interesting. The rest of this book was just a lot of information about a dude I have gone out of my way to not know things about. Everything I know about Ted Bundy has been against my will and this book has been the biggest chunk of information. Every woman in this book is having a horrible time the entire time. Even though they never say his name it’s so clearly and obviously him that I wondered what the point of dancing around it even was, surely not to keep survivors like me from being irritated about this story still somehow being centered on his actions. 

I was desperate for someone to have something positive or uplifting happen. It’s a fictionalisation and this was what was fictionalised? You couldn’t have fictionalised a couple of women who were happy or had righteous fury? 

I also just wondered what the point of the relentless “everyone was awful. Everything that happened was awful. What an awful time” vibe was. Did we learn anything? No shit cops are useless. The justice system is misogynistic. There are such a thing as women who perpetuate misogyny as a coping mechanism. Abusers usually come from abuse. People don’t believe women. This came out in 2023… was this a big reveal for anyone?

And to just be super extra clear here, I absolutely did not want to read a Ted Bundy book. I don’t think that by telling the story through the eyes of women adjacent to his victims it becomes not a Ted Bundy book. I now without seeking any of it out know more things about Ted Bundy, and nothing truthful that I can say definitively about the women since their story was “fictionalised” so I am irritated and it wasn’t for me and I didn’t vibe at all. 

PLEASE STOP TALKING/WRITING/MAKING THINGS ABOUT THIS LOSER OF A DUDE, directly or indirectly, subversive or not, just stop making fucking Bundy stuff. No one’s Bundy thing is special. I need to stop hearing about this man or I will start a very large fire somewhere and walk away thank you.

What this book is not: A true crime book or a thriller.

What this book is: A fictionalized story of the Ted Bundy murder victims(though he is only called The Defendants, and the women are given different names) that focuses on the women involved. Those who were killed, those who survived and experienced life-long trauma. It's a dual-perspective novel told from the perspective of Pamela (who survived the Florida State killings) and Ruth(who was murdered in Washington).

What I loved about this book was the focus on the women. For so long, Bundy was sensationalized and portrayed as intelligent, capable, and larger than life. Women were called out for putting themselves into situations that somehow "caused" what happened. This story reminds us that NO woman is responsible for violence against her, and the women involved deserve to be remembered as people who were strong, capable, and had a future. As a woman, this book made me sad and angry, and it will stick with me.

Cheri McElroy

What this book is not: A true crime book or a thriller.

What this book is: A fictionalized story of the Ted Bundy murder victims(though he is only called The Defendants, and the women are given different names) that focuses on the women involved. Those who were killed, those who survived and experienced life-long trauma. It's a dual-perspective novel told from the perspective of Pamela (who survived the Florida State killings) and Ruth(who was murdered in Washington).

What I loved about this book was the focus on the women. For so long, Bundy was sensationalized and portrayed as intelligent, capable, and larger than life. Women were called out for putting themselves into situations that somehow "caused" what happened. This story reminds us that NO woman is responsible for violence against her, and the women involved deserve to be remembered as people who were strong, capable, and had a future. As a woman, this book made me sad and angry, and it will stick with me.

Abby Brake &
Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll

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Abby Brake &Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll

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Abby Brake &
Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll