No One Can Know: A Novel

Content Warning: The novel contains descriptions of emotional and domestic abuse, anti-LGBTQ+ bias, and references to suicide.

The protagonist of the novel, Emma Palmer is also its most prominent point-of-view character and a stand-in for the reader. Emma is an unreliable narrator, in part because she cannot acknowledge that she is an abusive marriage with Nathan. However, as the plot proceeds, Emma’s narration becomes more self-aware. The author shows that Emma reinvented herself as an adult, suppressing her outspoken and rebellious teenage self for a quieter, more non-confrontational persona. This change is a reaction to the traumatic events of her early life, illustrating the theme of The Effects of Abuse and Trauma. Fourteen years after her parents’ deaths, Emma is a freelance website designer, married to Nathan, and newly pregnant. An outstanding artist as a child, Emma gave up her art school aspirations and has not “put a brush to a canvas in over a decade” (246), reflecting her parents’ violent rejection of her dreams.

Emma’s character is forced to evolve when she returns to her childhood home at Nathan’s insistence, and the author demonstrates that Emma’s dynamic with Nathan is unhealthy. Emma tends to exaggerate her own faults, and downplay those of others, especially Nathan.