Bright Young Women

The novel switches to Ruth’s point of view and to a different point in time. Ruth is 25 years old, divorced, and living with her mother just outside Seattle; her father passed away the previous year. Ruth begins attending a support group for individuals experiencing complex grief. At the support group, she meets a woman named Tina and is immediately struck by her: “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” (89).

The text returns to events in Florida in 1978. After seeing the “Wanted” poster Tina showed her, Pamela hurries to the police station. Pamela shows them the poster and states that this is the man she saw. However, the police tell her that Tina is “interfering with an active police investigation” (94) by promoting her theory that the man on the poster is responsible for the attack. They also explain that Roger isn’t who he claims to be; he has a history of mental illness and got accepted into Florida State University by using false records and pretending to be younger than he is.