"A young woman, desperate to escape the unspoken secrets of her impoverished Midwestern family, bluffs her way into college ... where she meets Jess, charismatic and rich and needy, and the two quickly form an insular, competitive friendship ... As guilt builds for the sister she has left behind, the narrator is drawn into Jess's apparently effortless existence ... But the death of one of [the Tylenol Killer's] victims triggers a surprising chain of events with major repercussions for the lives of both young women. Suddenly the lifestyle the narrator has come to share with Jess vanishes. As her attempts to restore order and control become increasingly desperate, their fragile friendship is exposed; and both young women must confront the realities of an adulthood neither one expected"--

1980s. A young woman, desperate to escape the unspoken secrets of her impoverished Midwestern family, bluffs her way into a Chicago college. There she meets Jess, charismatic and rich and needy, and the two women form an insular, competitive friendship. As the city is terrorized by the Tylenol Killer, it triggers major repercussions: the lifestyle the narrator has come to share with Jess vanishes, and her attempts to restore order and control become increasingly desperate.