Invisible Girl: A Novel

Cate Fours, the 50-year-old wife of Roan Fours, is a physiotherapist who works from home. Cate has two children with Roan, Josh and Georgia. Jewell characterizes Cate as a kind, loving woman who has trouble trusting her own instincts, even though they are usually correct. Roan constantly cheats on Cate throughout their relationship, and uses techniques of emotional abuse to make her believe she’s the one in the wrong when she tries to confront him. Cate’s character arc sees her learning to trust herself and her instincts, regaining her autonomy, ultimately rejecting Roan’s attempts to manipulate her into thinking that she is losing her mind.

At the start of Cate’s arc, Jewell depicts the character as heavily swayed by ingrained bias and fears of the unknown as she navigates the world around her. Cate feels uneasy in the family’s rented flat because it’s located in an unfamiliar neighborhood, making her suspicious of everything. The local rise in sexual assaults exacerbate her fears. After Harrison assaults Tilly, Cate springs into action, falsely accusing Owen because of his strange behavior and spreading gossip and misinformation in the neighborhood. Later, as Cate’s arc progresses, she feels guilty for suspecting Owen of wrongdoing simply because of his appearance and her own bias and becomes more introspective, investigating the suspicious activity in her own home and realizing with horror that Josh and Roan are the most likely suspects involved with Saffyre’s disappearance.

The internal growth that Cate experiences allows her to see her relationship with Roan through a new lens. Jewell uses Cate’s flashbacks of her relationship with Roan to highlight her growing realization of the ways in which Cate has been gaslit by her husband over the years. Cate realizes Roan knows how to manipulate her by taking advantage of her inner doubt. Cate finally begins to trust her instincts that Roan is behaving strangely, and it motivates her to uncover the truth. Cate’s inner growth stems from her ability to trust herself and what she wants for her life, even with Roan telling her that she is wrong. Once Cate realizes the power of her instincts, she leaves Roan and takes the children back to their renovated house, even though Roan begs her not to leave him. In the novel’s resolution, Jewell depicts Cate breaking the established pattern of her relationship with Roan: Rather than caving to Roan’s wishes, she decides she is worthy of happiness and is empowered to make her own decisions about her life.

Jewell describes Owen Pick as a shy man in his thirties who lives with his aunt Tessie across the street from the Fours’ rental. Owen’s issues with anger, (particularly toward women) and his isolationist attitude make him the perfect target for incel culture. Owen’s suspension from his university job for sexual harassment allegations, exacerbates his feelings of resentment and entitlement, making him more susceptible to believing the conspiracy theories and ideology of incel culture. Although Owen eventually changes his behavior, he must first unravel the learned misogynistic patterns of his childhood in order to complete his character arc in the narrative.

Owen feels drawn to incel culture because it allows him to place the blame for his own disappointments onto other people, specifically women, rather than himself. Owen allows the outrage at what he believes to be false claims of sexual harassment to extend his anger toward all women. As Owen delves further into the incel forums, he finds a community who share and encourage these same impulses. His need for connection makes him desperate to be accepted even in an online forum fueled by hate and violence, highlighting the novel’s thematic interest in The Psychological Impact of Loneliness. While the online incel forums allow Owen to play out these fantasies without repercussions, meeting Bryn—who actively encourages rape and violence—in person forces Owen to confront the real-life consequences of this ideology. Although Owen feels angry toward women, he knows they don’t deserve to be raped or harmed because of that anger. Owen takes action and begins immediately disentangling himself from the world of incel culture, but his decision to accept the date-rape drugs Bryn gives him becomes a key piece of evidence in his arrest. Jewell makes a distinction between Owen’s blackouts and problematic behavior toward women when drinking alcohol and his sober behavior, emphasizing the effects of alcohol on his judgment. As Owen grows as a character, he learns to recognize and take responsibility for these triggers and move away from them in his life. In the novel’s resolution, Owen finds personal redemption in his relationship with Deanna, who accepts him for who he is, understanding that his growth is still in progress. As Owen unravels the years of learned misogyny from his father and other masculine figures in his life, he realizes that he has allowed fear to rule him and blamed women for his unhappiness, rather than accepting responsibility for his own actions.