Did you read The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth and need a character list, a plot summary that runs down that past/present storyline and a place to ask and answer questions? You are in the right place at my Spoiler Discussion for The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth. Welcome!
Spoiler Discussion for The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth
Here’s what this post will contain:
Characters in The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth
Main Plot Events (Past and Present) in The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth
Spoiler Discussion for The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth
Characters in The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth
Characters
Pippa Gerard: Australian lawyer and mother of two daughters; lives outside Melbourne
Gabe Gerard: Pippa’s husband, a stay-at-home dad.
Kat: Pippa’s sister
Mei: Kat’s wife; used to work with Gabe.
Freya: Gabe and Pippa’s young daughter
Asha: Gabe’s daughter with a woman who died of an overdose, according to Gabe.
Amanda Cameron: woman who fell off the Drop behind the Gerard house.
Max Cameron: Amanda’s husband and Gabe’s former boss.
Arthur Spriggs: money launderer; investor in some of Max Cameron’s projects.
Baz: Max’s bodyguard
Thelma: Gabe’s therapist
Dr Ravi: Gabe’s therapist
Dev: owner of the Pantry, a neighborhood cafe.
Main Plot Events (Past and Present) in The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth
The book has two narrators, Pippa Gerard and Amanda Cameron (who is deceased).
The timeline alternates between the present (the aftermath of Amanda’s death) and the past (events leading up to her death).
List of Events (SPOILERS AHEAD)
PAST EVENTS IN THE SOULMATE BY SALLY HEPWORTH
Max’s brother Harry takes his own life and his family finds out that Harry’s girlfriend, Marina, is pregnant.
After Marina dies, Max tracks down Gabriel, Harry and Marina’s son.
Meanwhile, Gabriel has met Pippa and Max has met Amanda.
Max tells Amanda he does not want children due to the mental health issues in his family. Amanda tells Max that due to her own father’s cheating, she insists on fidelity.
Gabriel and Pippa get married less than two months after meeting. Gabe is working as a landscaper. Max finds out, hires him to work on his garden, and offers him an internship and then a permanent job at NewsX, his media organization.
Two years later, Pippa gets pregnant. Gabe is doing well at his new job at NewsX and brings in a lot of investments.
After Pippa gives birth, she has severe postpartum depression, but Gabe helps her through it.
Gabe starts to have serious mental health issues and Pippa urges him to see a doctor. He’s diagnosed but ADHD and put on medication.
Gabe learns that while married to Pippa, he fathered a child by a woman who has since died of a drug overdose. He and Pippa take in the baby, named Asha.
Max, possibly because of Gabe, takes an investment from Arthur Spriggs, someone looking to launder dirty money.
Amanda is the victim of a home invasion, possibly as a result of the Spriggs being asked to sell back his shares.
Gabe and Max’s bodyguard, Baz, kidnap Spriggs. Gabe, intending to menace Spriggs, accidentally shoots him.
Amanda overhears the murder of Spriggs. Max tells her that Gabe did it.
Baz and Gabe hide the body and Max tells Gabe he can’t work at NewZ anymore.
Pippa, worried about Gabe’s behavior and a time he came home with blood on him, calls Max for help.
Max tells Pippa to come to the office and they will figure it out. He tells her that Gabe was fired weeks ago and after that, vandalized the office.
Pippa tries to kiss Max but he tells her he’s in love with Amanda. Then Max gets a call that Gabe has been taken to the hospital.
Gabe is diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Max tells Amanda about his brother, Harry.
Pippa tells Gabe about Max, but for some reason she tells him that she slept with Max.
Gabe and Pippa decide to leave Melbourne. They end up on a house near the Drop, a place where people take their own lives. But Gabe has a talent for talking people down and saves a half dozen people. He also becomes a stay-at-home dad to Freya and Asha.
Amanda, who is aware that her husband has a secret laptop, finds it. On the laptop, she finds a reference to a deleted video. She manages to recover it and sees Pippa kissing her husband.
Amanda wonders if Gabe’s mental health issues were real, or just a ruse that Max was using to cover up an affair? She decides to put the video on a flash drive and go talk to Gabe.
PRESENT EVENTS IN THE SOULMATE BY SALLY HEPWORTH
Amanda shows up at the Gerard’s house. She tells Gabe that she wants to talk to Pippa. Gabe says he knows that Pippa and Max were intimate, but not about the video. They struggle over the USB stick and Amanda falls.
Pippa sees this and thinks Gabe might have pushed Amanda, but says nothing to the police. She sees Gabe drop a silver object in the rocks near the beach.
Pippa is shocked to find out the victim is Amanda Cameron. She’s panic stricken, knowing that eventually the police will figure out the connection between her, Max, Amanda and Gabe.
Max starts to investigate Amanda’s death and goes to talk to the Gerards. The police also want to talk to Max about Amanda, Gabe and Spriggs.
Max smashes the secret laptop and tries to get the Gerards to talk to him. He tells Gabe he doesn’t believe the story and he wants the USB drive back.
The police are beginning to connect the dots. Gabe calls Max and tells him to come and get the USB.
Max calls the police and confesses to the murder of Arthur Spriggs.
Then Max goes to the Gerard house. He tells Pippa and Gabe that he wants to know what happened to Amanda. Gabe insists that Amanda was distraught because she thought Max slept with Pippa. Gabe is confused as he thought Max DID sleep with Pippa. Pippa realizes that Amanda didn’t jump.
Gabe tells Max that Amanda considered Max her soulmate.
Max jumps off the drop. Now that Amanda knows that Max loved her and didn’t cheat on her, she can move on to the afterlife.
Pippa divorces Gabe but they co-parent together and Pippa starts dating Dev.
Spoiler Discussion for The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth
As I say in my Review of the Soulmate, I feel like this book is plotted like a thriller, but at the end, turns into more of women’s fiction.
This is my second book by Sally Hepworth. My first was The Younger Wife.
What did you think of the concept of soulmates in the book?
After I read a book seems thematic, I try to ask myself what the book is saying. The Soulmate, not surprisingly, seems to be about soulmates. Therein, for me, lies the problem.
Pippa thought Gabe was her soulmate because even though he cheated on her and murdered someone, he helped her through post-partum depression.
Amanda thought Max was her soulmate until she found footage of him kissing Pippa. Then she got stuck in some kind of purgatory. She hovered there, watching everything, until she learned that Max hadn’t been unfaithful and then was able to move on to the after life. Max then can’t live without her and takes his own life.
What did you think of the characters in The Soulmate and the choices they made?
Gabe was so erratic I assumed he had some untreated mental health issues. To Pippa’s credit, she did try to help him. Clearly Gabe has a calling as a therapist, so I hope he goes in that direction.
I felt bad for Amanda. She was willing not to have children to please Max and all she wanted was a faithful husband. She got a husband who kept secrets from her but loved her in his own way, I guess.
Max was too nice for his own good. I know he wanted to help Gabe, but he was just enabling him by putting him in a position where he could do damage to everyone.
It surprised me that Pippa was a lawyer and never suggested hiring a lawyer to help manage the police questioning.
Why did Pippa tell Gabe that she slept with Max?
Was it to get back at him for his unfaithfulness? I didn’t get that or I missed it.
What did you think of the revelation at the end of The Soulmate?
The book had such twisty plotting that I was waiting for some sort of Big Twist at the end. The revelation that Gabe was Max’s nephew wasn’t all that shocking. I expected that there had to be some connection between the two of them. There’s also a clue when Pippa is recalling the event and is struck by how much Max reminds her of Gabe.
Do you have other questions, comments, or thoughts? Leave a comment and let’s discuss!
Can you summarize what Gabe did to protect his family and give evidence if that’s possible?
Sorry. I wasn’t a fan of Gabe at all.