On December 1, 1946, Paula Jean Welden put on a bright red parka and disappeared from her dorm at Bennington College in Vermont. Eighteen, white, blonde, wealthy — she was never found. Each chapter of QUANTUM GIRL THEORY imagines a life Paula Jean Welden may have lived after she left that room: in love with a woman in a Communist cell and running from her blackmailer in 1950s New York. A literary forger on the verge of discovery at the advent of the computer age. A disgraced showgirl returning home to her m
“Inventive….Ryan’s novel takes up what true-crime aficionados would call the “less dead”: victims of violence or missing people from marginalized communities who fail to garner the same attention as idealized victims—namely, straight White young women. Ryan takes a meta approach here; the novel is as much about the way we mythologize this type of missing and murdered victim as it is a twisty mystery….A puzzler that is both brainy and full of satisfying narrative brawn.” — Kirkus
“Intriguing…[Ryan] has a knack for clever turns of phrase and imbues her concept with smart insights on the public’s fascination with missing girls and young women.” — Publishers Weekly