Joanna Pearson's intricate debut novel, Bright and Tender Dark, cleverly ties in true-crime tropes as it traces the ripple effects of a college student's murder in 2000.
Karlie Richards, a popular 19-year-old University of North Carolina freshman, was a leader in the campus evangelical group. In her final months, however, she rebelled by experimenting with drinking and sex. Rumor had it she was involved with Jacob Hendrix, her sociology professor. When Karlie was found strangled to death in her apartment, Toby Braithwaite, an intellectually disabled man who worked at a local diner and had a crush on Karlie, was arrested. He's jailed for the crime, though he is widely believed to be innocent.
The framing story, set two decades later, in 2019, has Karlie's freshman roommate, Joy Brunner, finding an unopened letter from Karlie addressed to her in an old book. Joy's life recently fell apart after her husband left her for his pregnant girlfriend. The amateur investigation spurred by the letter turns into a writing project that offers Joy fresh purpose. The timing couldn't be better, though, as the docuseries Murder Real Estate has been in town filming at the apartment complex where Karlie died, but Joy's obsession endangers her mental health.
Pearson contrasts 1999 and 2019 via documents including newspaper articles and Reddit threads, portraying the dangers of the social media era through a vicious online debate and an incriminating viral video. The multiple, often unexpected third-person limited perspectives--of Joy's teenage son, Sean; Toby's mother, Sheri, a college janitor; Hendrix's wife, Lila, a nurse at the university health clinic--contribute vital clues, although they threaten to overcomplicate the narrative. There is a sensitive portrayal of a trans character, and a hint that Karlie is aiding the inquiry from beyond the grave that infuses the storyline with hope.
Religion takes on major significance here. The title's oxymoron juxtaposes light and dark, good versus evil, but the situation is subtler. Ambivalence reigns: Joy is a missionary's daughter whose father's advancing illness eroded her faith; Karlie questioned everything; another character escapes a cult. It all makes for a convincing--if bleak--post-religious landscape. The story feels additionally timely due to the perennial hot-button issues of professor-student romances and the line between consensual sex and coercion.
Bright and Tender Dark's many facets mesh satisfyingly by the end. This is a perfect choice for true-crime readers of I Have Some Questions for You and My Dark Vanessa. --Rebecca Foster, freelance reviewer, proofreader and blogger at Bookish Beck
Shelf Talker: Joanna Pearson's multi-perspective debut novel comments on toxic religion and true-crime enthusiasm as it chronicles the search for justice for a murdered college freshman.