Book Review of Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll
Bright Young Women begins with the infamous Florida sorority house killings in 1978 by a very famous serial killer (whose name is purposefully not used). Read our book review to see why his name is not given, plus our overall thoughts on Bright Young Women, and see if it is one you want to add to your TBR.
This is a book blog post featuring Bright Young Women book review and discussion, plus book recommendations for other similar books we think you might enjoy.
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Slowprose Review Format
Generally speaking, we don’t think of ourselves as “serious” reviewers, so our format may be a little different. Here is what to expect when you are reading Slowprose book reviews:
- Cover Review – doing the cliche of judging a book by its cover.
- Book Blurb – we share the book jacket or Goodreads blurb about the plot.
- Intrusive Thoughts – these are the general thoughts and feelings we have about the book while reading it.
- Book review – our overall review and star ranking of the book
- Book aesthetics – this is how gorgeous we thought the pages of the book were, or how easy/hard it was to read, or how good the narrator was if it is an audio book.
- Book recommendations – we talk about the author’s other books or other books that remind us of this book in some form or fashion. Basically, this is our catch-all to talk about anything else that we want to.
To see our full review system, including our method of assigning and weighting stars, go here.
COVER REVIEW – Bright Young Women
Bright Young Women gets 4.0 stars for this cover.
This is a great book cover for several reasons. It is certainly easy to spot on a bookshelf or on display at a book store or library based on the bright, contrasting colors. We wouldn’t say that the colors are super aesthetic, necessarily, but rather they are eye catching and make a statement.
We like the change in the fonts, which are still very easy to read. They add to the interest on this cover without distracting.
The image is also really good. It evokes beauty as well as foreboding with the color shading of her face. This whole cover is kind of hypnotic, and it hints at it being a hypnotic read.
Really great book cover!
BOOK BLURB – Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll
Given our extreme irrational fear of ever being a spoiler of an epic plot twist, we will just share the book insert or book blurb found on Goodreads to provide the information in terms of the plot:
Bright Young Women
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.
Saturday night is a night of promise, excitement, and desire, but Pamela Schumacher, sorority president, 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. She becomes a key witness, and 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.
The story takes place on opposite sides of the country, as 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 missing friend.
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 with deadly results.
INTRUSIVE THOUGHTS – Bright Young Women
Jumping right in to the sorority house night.
*shivers* makes us think about the Idaho 4. 🙁
Love the behind the scenes on the night of the event
Hope we follow the victims up until the fateful day
Ok, not really where the story is going
Not really feeling the Ruth storyline
Confused as to connection here?
Oh ok, see it now.
Checking to see if any one is real
Flip Flip Flip….actually bored.
Very underwhelmed.
BRIGHT YOUNG WOMEN BOOK REVIEW
Slowprose Star Rating – 3.0 Stars
We just weren’t feeling this one, yall.
Since we finished this book we have been trying to figure out the disconnect. That’s the issue right there, this book did not connect with us.
We loved the premise of this book – not the execution of it.
The premise of Bright Young Women is to take back power for the brilliant women who were murdered and to shine a bright light on the power the media/society put on the killer.
It is a sharp examination of our culture and why he was continuously referenced as being handsome, charming, smart, etc. Until this book, we hadn’t really thought of that or made that realization. But when you think of him, those are definitely characteristics you would use to describe him. Plus, serial killer. But that is almost an afterthought, you know?
This was true decades ago when the story was in the forefront of tabloid fascination, but continues to this day. In a recent Netflix adaption, it still seemed to focus on “positive” attributes rather than his heinous acts, or even nuances of his criminal psychology.
The author purposefully did not use his name in this book. That is a powerful statement.
Using the title Bright Young Women to counter the narrative that was used to describe the killer – that he was so smart. Pointing out that the victims here were the smart ones. They were Bright. Young. Women. Definitely love that.
But UGH. Frustrated that this book didn’t connect in its story. Part of the issue was that it is based on an actual event, but the characters used in the book were fictional. So that was strange. It wasn’t an in depth analysis of realistic events. It wasn’t a breakneck thriller, and we wouldn’t consider it a psychological thriller either.
It is more like a hybrid of true crime and historical fiction that just didn’t work for us.
Beyond that, we did not at all connect to the ongoing story, and particularly how it tried to tie together with Ruth. We just didn’t care about these characters and lost interest in finding out what happened to them.
Half way through this one, we started to skim. Got the gist of what was going on and nothing made us want to go back and read more in depth. Even the part of the story centered around Ruth and the infamous murderer. It should have been RIVETING and ENRAGING. Instead, it was almost perfunctory.
The ending left us emotionless and ready to move on to the next book. No book hangover here.
Bright Young Women is a unique book though, so even though it didn’t work for us, we can’t say we don’t recommend it. We would say try it out yourself and see what you think. It was actually a Goodreads Choice award finalist for best mystery & thriller, so there are obviously plenty of rave reviews. We appear to be in the minority on how we feel about this book.
If you have read it, please tell us what you thought!
Slowprose Star Rating – 3.0 Stars
BOOK AESTHETICS – Bright Young Women
We love our library and are so thrilled when we see hot new releases on the stacks. This read was from our local library. Easy enough to read, nothing notable in terms of interior jacket or artwork.
BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS
We read Ann Rule’s Book The Stranger Beside Me and it is still the best telling of this true crime story. If you want to read about these actual victims and the story surrounding them, this is the book we would recommend. It holds up after all these years.
Bright Young Women is Jessica Knoll’s latest novel. She is the author of The Favorite Sister as well as being the author of the bestselling novel Luckiest Girl Alive.
Knoll’s provocative novel has recently been turned into a major motion picture from Netflix and stars Mila Kunis. She is an author whose momentum keeps growing with each one of the great stories she publishes.
HER PERFECT LIFE IS A PERFECT LIE. As a teenager at the prestigious Bradley School, Ani FaNelli endured a shocking, public humiliation that left her desperate to reinvent herself. Now, with a glamorous job, expensive wardrobe, and handsome blue blood fiancé, she’s this close to living the perfect life she’s worked so hard to achieve. But Ani has a secret. There’s something else buried in her past that still haunts her, something private and painful that threatens to bubble to the surface and destroy everything.
You can find all these and more in our storefront, Slowestuff Books From The Blog storefront.
We are so curious as to what you thought about Bright Young Women, so leave us a comment if you have read it!
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Happy reading!
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