Under the Influence
A Novel
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4.0 • 123 Ratings
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
The New York Times bestselling author of Labor Day and After Her returns with a poignant story about the true meaning—and the true price—of friendship.
Drinking cost Helen her marriage and custody of her seven-year-old son, Ollie. Once an aspiring art photographer, she now makes ends meet taking portraits of school children and working for a caterer. Recovering from her addiction, she spends lonely evenings checking out profiles on an online dating site. Weekend visits with her son are awkward. He’s drifting away from her, fast.
When she meets Ava and Swift Havilland, the vulnerable Helen is instantly enchanted. Wealthy, connected philanthropists, they have their own charity devoted to rescuing dogs. Their home is filled with fabulous friends, edgy art, and dazzling parties.
Then Helen meets Elliott, a kind, quiet accountant who offers loyalty and love with none of her newfound friends’ fireworks. To Swift and Ava, he’s boring. But even worse than that, he’s unimpressed by them.
As Helen increasingly falls under the Havillands’ influence—running errands, doing random chores, questioning her relationship with Elliott—Ava and Swift hold out the most seductive gift: their influence and help to regain custody of her son. But the debt Helen owes them is about to come due.
Ollie witnesses an accident involving Swift, his grown son, and the daughter of the Havillands’ housekeeper. With her young son’s future in the balance, Helen must choose between the truth and the friends who have given her everything.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this, her ninth novel, Maynard depicts one woman's moral dilemma. Helen's first-person narrative details her adult life and how it spiraled out of control after the divorce from her ex-husband Dwight. Helen was devastated after a drinking bout and a DWI led to the loss of custody of her son, Ollie. While working at an art gallery and barely getting by in San Francisco, Helen meets Ava and Swift Havilland, wealthy philanthropists who take her under their wing as Ava agrees to pay Helen to take pictures of her art collection. Ava and Swift also treat Helen to dinners and give her a glimpse of their everyday privileged existence. And when Helen is at her lowest point with her son, who seems uninterested in spending time with her, Swift treats Ollie like a son, teaching him how to swim. Yet what begins as a seemingly altruistic friendship on the part of the Havillands turns into a quid pro quo when a disastrous accident involves Ollie and Helen, forcing them to tell the police the Havillands' versions of events or else become victims of their vicious threats. Maynard's (Labor Day) latest is illuminating and mesmerizing, highlighting not only differing definitions of friendship, but the shades of gray between right and wrong and the lengths to which some will go to protect their self-interest.
Customer Reviews
Under the Influence
Liked the character development of the narrator Helen as she moved from an almost infantile young woman into an adult, tempered by crushing disappointment, into a mature woman accepting of life’s injustices.