A Love/Hate Affair
The Teacher is one of those books that you’re either going to love or hate. And if you do love this one, the ending may just shake that feeling down to one of wild annoyance or incredulous head-shaking. Yes, Freida McFadden’s latest thriller is that polarizing.
The story is going to be triggering for some, and basically revels in infidelity, murder and seduction. I won’t go into spoiler territory here but suffice to say, it also involves a school. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions there!
The narrative swings back and forth between two central protagonists (three if you count the second and third parts of the book late on). Eve is a woman who seemingly has it all. She’s got a gorgeous husband, a well-respected job as a Math teacher and she gets to buy all the shoes she can possibly want. The only trouble is, she’s not happy with her husband, Nate. And she wants a way out.
Meanwhile, Caseham High (where Eve works) also plays host to a troubled student called Addie. A big scandal involving a student-teacher affair has caused her to be ostracised from the other kids. Even worse, she spends most of her school day being tormented by fellow student Kenzi. However, Addie does start to take a fancy to her English teacher… who happens to be none other than Eve’s husband, Nate.
Given the story runs for around 380 pages or so, there’s actually a pretty decent pace to this one. There’s perhaps a bit too much dallying around when it comes to dragging the central themes out, but it is effective, especially when some of the plot twists start to be thrown into the story.
The trouble is, Freida McFadden doesn’t know when to leave her story alone. The third part, and the epilogue that follows, basically break the story to the point of feeling nonsensical and stupid thanks to an abundance of plot twists. A couple of huge plot holes show too (we’ll discuss that in our ending explained!) while the final reveal – as good as it is – exposes most of these characters as the unlikable people that they are.
You see, Eve isn’t very empathetic and she’s hard to root for. Her moral compass is all over the shop and while that may be intentional, Addie’s character comes armed with her own set of problems. However, as the story progresses she does become much more empathetic compared to Eve, who never really warms into the story as someone you want to root for.
The story is well written though and McFadden definitely has a knack for writing these characters with a believable tone of voice. It’s just a pity then that the narrative takes such a questionable turn as there’s potential here for this to be one of 2024’s brightest thrillers. Instead, people are going to be talking about this one for all the wrong reasons.
Read More: The Teacher Ending Explained
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Verdict - 5/10
5/10