Joanna Pearson’s debut novel, BRIGHT AND TENDER DARK, is forthcoming with Bloomsbury on June 4, 2024. Her second story collection, NOW YOU KNOW IT ALL (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2021), was chosen by Edward P. Jones for the 2021 Drue Heinz Literature Prize and named a finalist for the Virginia Literary Awards. Her first story collection, EVERY HUMAN LOVE (Acre Books, 2019) was a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Awards, the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize for Fiction, and the Foreword INDIES Awards. Joanna has received support as a fiction writer from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference and the North Carolina Arts Council/Durham Arts Council, and support as a poet from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Sewanee Writers’ Conference, and Yaddo. She holds an MFA in poetry from the Johns Hopkins University Writing Seminars and an MD from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Originally from western North Carolina, she now lives with her husband and two daughters near Chapel Hill, where she works as a psychiatrist

Books by Joanna Pearson

Bright and Tender Dark

by Joanna Pearson - Fiction

Days after the dawn of Y2K, beautiful, charismatic 19-year-old Karlie Richards is found brutally murdered in her campus apartment. Two decades later, those who knew Karlie --- and those who just knew of her --- remain consumed by her death. Among them is her freshman year roommate, Joy, now middle-aged and mid-divorce, living in the same college town and desperate for a new beginning. Upon finding a letter from Karlie, Joy is convinced the wrong man was convicted. Soon she dives into the dark world of internet conspiracy, sleuth blogs and others touched by the long, sensational aftermath of this crime. They include: the trans night manager of the building where Karlie was killed; the mother of the man serving time; and the professor Karlie had a relationship with before her death.