"I want you to remember, every time I say The Defendant, is not him but the seventy-one-year-old court reporter in cat-eye glasses who refused to participate in the outright lie of him."

"Law enforcement would rather we remember a dull man as brilliant than take a good hard look at the role they played in this absolute horror show, and I am sick to death of watching them in their pressed shirts and cowboy boots, in their comfortable leather interview chairs, in hugely successful and critically acclaimed crime documentaries, talking about the intelligence and charm and wiliness of an ordinary misogynist. This story is not that. This story is not that."

This is a fantastic book, a completely unique take on the subject.

I agree with the above. His name has been mentioned too many times, his notoriety has grown to mythical proportions. The accepted narrative is not the one that the author wants to tell. When it comes right down to it, it is the women who deserve that spotlight. The women who deserve to be lauded, remembered, and praised for their survival instinct. That is what Jessica Knoll has done with this novel. She has brought to light all that the women did to make sure that this man did not survive any longer than necessary, and that he was just a man. Just an ordinary, albeit evil man of mediocre intelligence.

I grew up in the Pacific Northwest, where The Defendant started his reign of terror in the 1970s. Although I was a child when all of this happened, I grew up with it as part of the folklore of life in the 70s and 80s, with serial killers around every corner.

This book is inspired by true events follows two narrators and two timelines. The first is Pamela, the president of the Florida State University sorority house where the two murders and two additional attacks took place that led to his death sentence. The book starts with those attacks and moves forward. The second is with Ruth, a woman in Washington state who is friends with Tina, who ends up meeting Pamela and ties the two narratives together.

This book made me experience the gamut of emotions: anger, sorrow, frustration, irritation, futility, and such deep respect for any woman who encountered The Defendant. The misogyny of the 1970s were truly what allowed this man to get away with what he was doing for so long. Knoll's narrative makes it clear that it wasn't his "intelligence" that helped him, but rather the ineptitude of law enforcement and a series of very "lucky" circumstances.

For those who are interested in true crime and looking at true crime from a different perspective, then definitely pick this one up. I listened to it as an audiobook and the narrators were fantastic and gave an "out loud" voice to the women that Knoll so respectfully depicts in her story.

This one is so interesting, because you get the entire story from the start - there's no "whodunnit" vibe, but the thrill and the suspense is still there. I imagine that must be really hard to nail in writing, so props to the author for doing this in a way that gives you all the answers but still keeps you very engaged throughout!

Bright Young Women is a thriller where you know the killer, the motive, and the ending from the very beginning, yet it is injected with such thrill, despair, and grief that I had a hard time putting it down. Pamela is an average university student who is catapulted into a nightmare when a predator falls upon her sorority house, murdering her best friend, and leaving her as the sole eyewitness to his grisly crime. Soon after, in the midst of dealing with her own grief, she is thrown into the media circus surrounding the serial killer, and meets Tina, who claims to know who the killer is, as years ago he murdered Ruth, the woman she loved. And thus the stage is set for the telling of the stories of two women who had their lives irreversibly changed by The Defendant.

The Defendant is Ted Bundy, although, as Pamela constantly reminds the reader, he is not the main character of this novel and shouldn’t be regarded with anything other than disdain and ridicule. What I loved so much about this story is that it was the stories of the women who were affected by this renowned killer, not another idol worship-esque recounting of his suaveness and killer charm. Pamela is a tour de force of a protagonist as she forces herself to become comfortable being brazen enough to fight for justice for her friend. I was struck in the chest multiple times with the stark portrayal of grief, and the likening of Denise to being eternally frozen in Pamela’s memory as we follow her pre-, during, and post-murder. The way Knoll plays with the concept of time to write the various timelines is as captivating as it is horrifying, and made for a striking examination of grief and moving on. This book had me holding my breath from the very first page, and I don’t think I’ve read anything like it before.

I wish I had a lot to say to explain how I felt about this. Unfortunately, it just rubbed me the wrong way really early on. The way the main character constantly refers to her figure and has a sort of ‘not like other girls vibe’ combined with not even vaguely veiled retelling of an actual murder. It’s just personally not for me.

Thanks to NetGalley for gifting me a copy of Bright Young Women By Jessica Knoll for an honest review. This is a work of fiction but based off the Ted Bundy serial killings. Instead of hearing how charismatic, clever and handsome he was, we are hearing how he wasn’t all that smart, he was awkward when talking to women, and how he wasn’t handsome at all. This book is told from the perspective of two women, We hear from Pamela, who was in the sorority house and saw “the defendant” leave after brutally hurting 3 young women, 2 of them not making it to the hospital. We also hear from Ruth, who will end up being one of “the defendants” victims.
This book gave me chills, thinking about how it was so easy for this man to break into the sorority house and cause so much harm. I think the most chilling part, was how much wasn’t done in the days after the attack on the sorority. The way these women were treated and how their feelings were pushed aside was cruel. The fear they had moving back into their sorority house, even after the guy was not caught.
If you are interested in true crime like books, this is for you! Jessica Knoll did an amazing job giving two different perspectives from young women who were or would eventually be affected by the cruelty of this man. Even though there is little justice, we know what happened, there are a million documentaries and movie dramatizations respecting “what happened.” This is a new, fresh take. 5 stars

It was hard for me to put down Bright Young Women, a fictionalized account of the actual crimes of Ted Bundy, known in the book only as the Defendant. Jessica Knoll expertly tells the horrifying story through the viewpoints of two main characters, Pamela and Tina, who are reportedly based on genuine people in history. I felt as though I was experiencing the horror of a murder in the sorority house when Knoll recounted the events in Tallahassee. This book evoked the emotions of sorrow, fear, and anger as I read, which is a credit to Knoll's writing. If you know the story of Ted Bundy, I highly recommend this read. Even though it is fiction, it is sprinkled with facts Knoll gathered from various sources affiliated with the case. The book also sets straight the perception of Ted Bundy as a good-looking and intelligent law student. The facts prove otherwise, and I was satisfied to learn that.

this was a great take on the serial killer novel. I loved how Jessica Knoll never gives the killer a name and focuses on the victims and their families instead. I could see the that the author used the Ted Bundy case as the framework for the novel.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for providing me with an advanced copy of Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll.

This title was originally shared with me through the publishers via Net Galley.(Apologies for the delay I had some technical issues) I thought it was engaging and well written. I enjoyed the split perspectives. I was interested in this title because I like to watch and listen to true crime shows. I loved that it focused on the women survivors and the lives lost rather than solely on the criminal like the press had done. There was a lot of growth and healing. I also liked how his name was never stated in the story but it was still clear who they were talking about. Pamela was a strong character and she had a great development. Ruth did too. Overall I really liked the book. Thanks for sharing!

This is a well-written novel. The problem I had with it was that it's a novel, not true crime. I respect the noble premise of taking the star power away from the killer — in this case, Ted Bundy, whose name is never mentioned, and focusing on the victims. But all I could think about while reading this was how the author was going to talk about him without mentioning him. Valiant effort, but it felt more like a writer's "what if" challenge than a legit novel.

This was a fictional retelling of the last murders that Ted Bundy committed at Florida State University in 1978. What I liked most was that it put the focus on the victims and the people who knew them. The author never once mentioned Bundy's name in this book. He is known only as "the defendant."

While hard to read at times, I think it helped to understand the grief and fear that the in real life girls at the Chi Omega sorority house experienced on the night of the murder and days to come.

The author did a great job researching this book. There were some facts that I had to look up as I had not heard of them before. This is a book that will stay with me for a long time.

4.5 stars rounded

I loved this book! Now my favorite by Jessica Knoll. A great true crime read. The switches in timelines kept me fully interested. I can't wait to see if this one gets an adaptation for series or movie!

As a fan of Jessica Knoll and true crime, this was a great book. I enjoyed getting to hear the story from the point of view of some of the women. I completely understand why she never said the name of the character based off Ted Bundy but after a while I got a bit repetitive hearing him called the defendant. That didn't make me love the book any less, just a heads up for future readers.

I received a free ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review..

This was an interesting concept. A fictional retelling of the serial killer Ted Bundy, but from the aspect of his victims rather than the killer. I liked the idea of learning more about the victims and the lives they lead and how their deaths affected those that loved them.. the story jumped in time quite a bit, but the author made it easy to follow. And, it made sense to the story. I felt it moved a little slower than I expected but overall it was an interesting read.

I went into this novel not knowing too much about it. I knew it was true crime fiction, and I knew I loved Jessica Knoll's previous books, and that was all I needed to know. The opening scene felt harrowingly familiar, and as I continued to read, I realized why: these were some of the young women targeted by He Who Shall Not Be Named, a notorious serial killer in the 1970s. I had heard this story dozens of times.

The premise of this book was ambitious and risky: adapting the lives of women who were murdered, assaulted, and traumatized by an infamous serial killer into a novel, but Knoll succeeded. It wasn't exactly a thriller, but I still had a hard time putting it down. Knoll captures the injustice and the emotions that come along with it so brilliantly. I especially appreciated how the killer was never named, which is why I will not be naming him in my review. Names have power. His name has been thrown around in the media and beyond for decades. He has even been called a "bright young man", hence the title of the book. A bright young man? You mean a sadistic serial killer and rapist? Please. These women had their entire lives ahead of them; lives that were tragically cut short by, frankly, an incel loser. He Who Shall Not Be Named was nothing close to a bright young man. In fact, he had a low IQ and simply didn't know how to interact with the opposite sex, which made him angry and aggressive. His "conventionally attractive" (ew) looks let him sneak under the radar, but anyone who encountered him soon realized he was extremely socially awkward and insecure.

Bright Young Women focuses on the women who suffered as a result of a notorious serial killer's crimes and paints a more accurate picture of He Who Shall Not Be Named. It smashes the notion that he was a handsome, charming Zac Efron-esque looking swindler (and yes, that movie is mentioned in the book as well and it is one I will never watch). When he wasn't breaking and entering to brutally assault college women in the middle of the night, he was trying to pick women up in broad daylight. But he didn't succeed because he was handsome and charming, rather these women immediately sensed something off about him and felt sorry for him.

Jessica Knoll took a risk with this one, and it paid off. I hope this is the start of a real reckoning with the problematic true crime obsession that has swept the nation and putting the focus back where it belongs: on the victims and survivors.

Knoll writes an interesting story combining fact and fiction about a serial killer we all know, but never names. Her emphasis is on the victims and the survivors of this notorious killer. While I found this book to be a good fictionalized account, I had just read A Light In The Dark, a true story by one of the actual survivors, making this one a bit anticlimactic. Thank you to Simon and Schuster and NetGalley for an ARC of this book.

Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll was such an emotional read. When I read the synopsis I knew it was going to be an emotional and psychological rollercoaster, but it was more thrilling and enthralling than I could have imagined. Knoll did such a great job developing the character's and giving the reader inner perspective iof each woman's story as they dealt with the mystery and cruelty they were experiencing. The author also did a great job highlighting both the strengths and weaknesses of the legal system (and law enforcement) of the 70s, especially in exploring the minimization and sexism women experienced. I would definitely recommend this book and author to others.

I was provided an ARC in exchange for an honest review. This review is my own opinion. Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I have always been a Jessica Knoll fan, but Bright Young Women is truly next level. It is refreshing to read a true crime novel Ted Bundy (or as he is more properly dehumanized in the novel as “the Defendant”) told from the perspective of the women who were in some way affected by his heinous crimes. The novel is divided into chapters told by several women — some over a period of time. The primary voice is that of Pamela — the only eyewitness of the Defendant — who was the president of the sorority at FSU where the Defendant killed two women and maimed two others. The other voice is that of Tina in Seattle who believes that the Defendant is a serial killer who killed her girlfriend Ruth, but people dismiss Tina and question her mental health simply because she is a lesbian. The novel burns like a white flame as we see — as late as 1978 — how women were discounted because of their gender while Ted Bundy was treated as a handsome genius. Indeed, he had to be treated this way to mask the incompetency of male law enforcement. This was one of the best novels I read this year, and it well deserves to be included in the New York Times Notable Book List for 2023. 5.0 out of 5.0 stars. Highly recommended.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a complimentary advanced copy of this book.

The Defendant is awful, but the women are strong. This story revolves around the brutal murders and assaults that happened to several victims by The Defendant. The writing is so honest and the women are portrayed in such a strong light. I highly recommend this book and will be reading it again.

PHENOMENAL. I can’t say enough about this amazing book. I’m a true crime junkie so of course I know the story this was based on. I appreciated Knoll’s feminist perspective on this story as well as how she approached the telling of it. It’s definitely hard to stomach at some points but ultimately felt like a giant middle finger to the serial killer who perpetrated these crimes. So satisfying.