Content Warning: This guide describes and analyzes the source text’s treatment of trauma, abuse, and mental health. The novel contains stigmatizing depictions of cross-dressing and an individual with a mental health condition, which relies on outdated and offensive tropes that connect mental health conditions with violence.

Norman Bates sits in the office of the Bates Motel, reading The Realm of the Incas as it begins to rain. Engrossed by the book’s description of a grotesque ritual, he hears his mother, Norma, enter the room. Norma asks why he has not opened the motel for guests. Norman bitterly reminds her that it is her fault they did not sell the property when they first heard the main highway would be moved. Now, they hardly have any customers. He works himself into a tirade, until his mother cuts him off, accusing him of having no gumption. Norman knows she is right. He could have taken control of his life, but he never did. Norma shames her son for his pathetic life and the books he reads about topics like psychology and the occult. She knows Norman wants to kill her but does not have the gumption. Norman tries to calm down, reminding himself that his mother is just an old lady.