A fierce, funny, and fearless novel.
Penny might be withdrawn, but she is not oblivious. She arrives in Ann Arbor hoping for a typical college experience, but is unexpectedly drawn into the glittering orbit of a charismatic but deeply troubled sorority girl with cutting wit and a pharmacy’s worth of pills at her disposal. Stella is initially an interesting figure for Penny, a young woman who wears her charms like armor. But as she looks closer, Stella’s armor is slowly chipped away, and Penny’s curiosity reshapes into obsession. Toxic relationships are set against a backdrop of frat-party excess, gossip-fueled rivalries, and the crushing pressures of beauty standards and social performance. Told in Penny and Stella’s alternating perspectives, the novel peels back layers of glamour to reveal raw truths about mental health struggles, body dysmorphia, sexual assault, and the self-destructive bargains women sometimes make to belong. Colley balances biting humor with unflinching honesty, capturing the absurdity and brutality of campus life in equal measure. As Penny and Stella’s relationship fractures under the weight of secrets, lies, and betrayals, the question becomes not just who they are to each other, but who they will allow themselves to be when the façade shatters.
Heather Colley has a sharp mind indeed, and that gift for dialogue, wry humor, and witty observations results in a fierce, funny, and fearless novel that fans of campus adventures are sure to find irresistible. Colley’s prose is the kind you fall into and absorb the mood of, and it crackles with both style and substance as she unapologetically tackles taboo subjects with empathy and nuance. Her characterization walks the fine line between larger than life and realistically dramatic, and Penny and Stella are two magnetic, messy, and unforgettable co-leads whose alternating perspectives escalate the tension and intimacy. The characters are tightly tied to the plot and constantly shaped and challenged by it, while the storytelling captures the absurdities and cruelties of campus life perfectly for a timely commentary on belonging and self-image that has a lot to teach us all. But there’s also a darker side that creeps out in the crueler moments, and it’s intriguing to see how Colley balances the more cutthroat elements of humor with genuine emotional weight. It makes for a read that leaves you occasionally unsettled, always entertained, and unable to look away. A real must-read for fans of ‘weird girl’ antiheroes, The Gilded Butterfly Effect is an uplifting, emotive tale that I would not hesitate to recommend.
