Freida McFadden is the queen of the popcorn thriller with lots of loyal fans. What did I think of her latest AND what’s the deal with the Barnes and Noble “Exclusive Edition?” Here’s my Spoiler Discussion for The Teacher by Freida McFadden with a full plot summary.
The Teacher by Freida McFadden
Published on February 6, 2024 by Poisoned Pen Press
I read The Teacher in February 2024
My Quick Take on The Teacher
- Very plot-driven, as this is a thriller you can read in one sitting!
- Loved the shoe fetish. Also, the shoes reminded me of the turtles in The Co-Worker. Which reminded me of the turtles in The Last Mrs. Parrish.
- The Barnes and Noble “exclusive” edition has a couple chapters of a future book, The Boyfriend and a short Q and A with Freida.
- Readers are VERY divided about the twists; so vote in my poll below!
Your Main Questions About the Teacher (discussed below)
- Did Eve know who “Jay” was?
- Did Jay know who Eve was?
- How was Hudson able to pick up Addie and Eve, and did he figure out the two pickups were connected?
Full Plot Summary/ Synopsis for The Teacher by Freida McFadden
The book starts Big Little Lies-style, with a prologue shows a person digging a grave. Whose grave and who is digging? You’ll have to wait and find out!
Everyone thinks Nate and Eve are in love, but Eve really loves shoes
Nate and Eve are high school teachers who have been married for eight years. But Eve lies to Nate about her expensive new Jimmy Choo pumps and seems dissatisfied with their relationship.
It’s the first day of a new school year and Addie, a student, is worried about a scandal from the prior year.
Eve talks to fellow teacher Shelby (who is wearing low budget Nine West pumps lol) about how Addie got a teacher named Art fired.
Addie eats lunch with a fellow student and they discuss the school’s power couple: Kenzie and Hudson, who is Addie’s former friend.
Eve goes to a store called Footsie and looks at Christian Louboutin pumps. She starts to shoplift them, then reconsiders.
Addie gets a note from her English teacher, Nate Bennett, asking her to see him after class.
Eve runs into Art Tuttle, and he warns her that her new student Addie is “troubled.”
Nate tells Addie that her poem is a lyrical masterpiece. Oh Addie…
Addie steals Kenzie‘s keys, then goes to the literary magazine meeting led by Mr. Bennett.
Eve and Nate aren’t that happily married
Eve tells Nate she’s “going out with a friend” but really she’s putting on her Manolo Blahnik boots so she can hook up with a shoe salesman named Jay. They go at it in the storeroom, surrounded by boxes of shoes.
Nate wants Addie to submit her poetry to a competition.
It’s Eve’s 30th birthday. Of course she has to decide what shoes to wear.
We also learned that Addie‘s father was a drunk who died after falling down a flight of stairs.
During Eve‘s birthday dinner, she and Nate fight about Addie. Nate thinks Art is a creeper, but Eve thinks Addie plotted to get Art fired. Thankfully, Eve’s lover, Jay, has left her some Sam Edelman red patent leather pumps as a present.
Kenzie pranked Addie by filling her locker with shaving cream, but Hudson helps her clean it up.
We also learn that Addie‘s father fell down the stairs after a shoving match with Hudson.
Kenzie accuses Addie of cheating on their math test. Eve Bennett wants to get the principal involved.
Addie uses her keys to go inside Kenzie‘s house.
Nate convinces Eve to give Addie a zero on the test instead of reporting her.
Nate Makes a Move on Addie
Of course Nate tells Addie that his marriage is over and that he feels a connection to Addie. They are SOULMATES. Of course she falls for his cheesy flattery.
Addie and Nate make out, then he drives her home. He arrives home all fired up and sleeps with Eve.
Addie and Nate have written (bad) poems for each other, which is foreplay. Yes, they start a relationship.
Eve sees Addie lurking in their backyard. Again, Nate tells Eve not to go to the principal.
Addie admits that she lied about Art Tuttle, who didn’t do anything wrong.
Eve realizes that Addie‘s actually stalking Nate, not her. She sees Nate and Addie kissing and realizes Nate is cheating on her with Addie.
Eve tells Jay about Nate’s cheating and Addie‘s lying. She gets drunk, and when Nate comes home, she tells him she knows about him and Addie. Eve asks for a divorce, and he agrees. She also wants him to resign as a teacher. He tells her she’s a drunk who hoards shoes (partly true.)
Nate also asks Eve if she told anyone about his relationship with Addie, and she says no. But Eve mentions that she took a picture of them kissing, and I think that’s when Nate decides he has to kill her.
Nate tells Addie that if Eve were dead, they could be together.
Addie shows up in Eve‘s kitchen. Eve accuses her of sleeping with Nate.
Addie says that she and Nate are in love, and hits Eve with a frying pan. Then Addie unlock Eve‘s phone and calls Nate.
Nate arrives and makes a plan: he’ll buy a train ticket on Eve‘s phone, pretend she went to New Jersey to visit her family, then they will bury her.
While Addie is getting bed sheets from upstairs to wrap Eve in, Eve wakes up. Nate asks her if she remembers what happened. Eve says Addie hit her with a frying pan.
Wrong answer! Nate strangles her.
Nate drives his car with Eve’s body in the trunk. Addie follows in Eve’s car. They’re going to leave Eve’s car at the railroad station and bury her body in a pumpkin patch.
Addie and Nate starts digging the grave. Nate claims he forgot to get Eve‘s purse out of the trunk, and needs to go grab it. (This is not true, because Addie finds the purse and buries it with Eve.)
Nate doesn’t come back. Addie finishes the burial and calls Hudson for help.
Addie tries to contact Nate, but he has deleted his messaging account.
Nate calls the police and mentions to them that Eve caught Addie cheating on the test and that Addie was stalking Eve. He’s a bit surprised to find a pair of dirty blue pumps in his kitchen. And then a bird.
The police show up to talk to Addie, who realizes that Nate is going to deny everything.
The police tell Nate that they think Addie had something to do with Eve’s disappearance. A new pair of shoes shows up in Nate’s mail, covered in dirt.
The police come talk to Addie, telling her that Nate is trying to convince them that she’s a mentally unbalanced stalker.
Kenzie shows up at Addie‘s house. She says she knows about Addie and Nate.
She then tells Addie that she and Nate have been sleeping together since freshman year. And that the bad poem was written for HER.
Kenzie and Addie go to the police and tell them everything.
What Was the Ending of The Teacher by Freida McFadden?
Nate drives back to the pumpkin patch to make sure Eve is actually dead. Someone hits him on the back of the head.
Eve was actually buried alive, but she was able to dig out of the grave. She also found her purse (which had her phone in it) and called Jay to pick her up. They are the ones who planted the shoes to taunt Nate. They hit Nate with a rock and bury him alive.
Addie and Hudson are friends again. Eve Bennett leaves town.
Freida McFadden is known for her twists, so ….
What’s the big twist in The Teacher?
Twist One: Jay is actually Hudson. If you’ve read Freida McFadden books, this is one of her favorite twists: the person who is actually someone else. But I still didn’t see that coming.
Twist Two: Nate’s bad poem wasn’t written for Addie or Kenzie.
Nate wrote it for Eve when he was her teacher and she was his (15 year old) student and has been (presumably) recycling it ever since.
Spoiler Discussion for The Teacher by Freida McFadden
Please leave any and all questions or corrections in comments and we will discuss! Here are the top questions from the comments (which you should read!)
ONE: Did Eve know that Jay was Hudson, since he is a student in the suburban school where Eve teaches?
I think the book suggests that no, Eve didn’t know who Jay was. Eve is a first person narrator and mentions that when she first went into the shoe store, the salesman “looked familiar.” She refers to Jay as her “shoe salesman lover.”
COMMENTERS SAID: But is it PLAUSIBLE that Eve did not realize “Jay” is sixteen year-old Hudson? He’s a football player at the school where she teaches!
It’s unclear how old Eve thinks Jay is.
- The book says that Hudson, a football player, is taller than Nate.
- Eve seems to think Jay is in a relationship and has a baby. She is annoyed that a woman keeps calling him and mentions resentfully that Jay is going back to “her.” I don’t think she’s thinking “Mom.” At one point she calls the caller (Hudson’s mom) “another woman.”
- I really don’t think she knows Jay is a student at her school.
Also, this is a clever way that McFadden protects her twist, as we assume that “Jay,” like Eve, is cheating on his partner.
But what do YOU think? A commenter made the point that Eve was groomed and abused by Nate, so maybe she became an abuser herself.
What do YOU think? Does Eve know who “Jay” is? Please vote below!
TWO: Does Jay know who Eve is?
He must! He gives her a fake name, which is my best argument. Otherwise, why would he just not use his real name? Then again, “Jay” is what the football team at school calls him, so it’s hardly a secret name.
I have no proof because he is a character with no POV.
THREE: Many commenters have said they found the underage relationships creepy.
I agree that it is 100% wrong for a teacher to get involved with a student. Remember, Art got fired when Addie lied and said he was inappropriate with her.
Many states have criminalized teacher/student relationships, even when the student is over the age of consent. If anyone knows the law in Massachusetts, tell us in comments.
BUT, as Nana points out in comments, Eve is not Jay’s teacher.
In addition, the teen characters in the book are all over the age of consent when the story takes place. In Massachusetts that’s how old you need to be to get a learner’s permit to drive. Both Hudson/Jay and Addie mention that they aren’t supposed to be driving at night without an adult in the car under the terms of their permit. I found this kind of funny: they are worried about breaking the permit rules, but not about murdering people and burying them alive!
Still, I think if it came out that Eve had been sleeping with any student at her school, she probably would have been fired and/or faced public scorn.
Nate did get involved with Kenzie when she was a freshman (and Eve when she was fifteen) so both of them were legally underage at that time.
Does learning that Nate was also Eve’s teacher and they had a relationship when she was underage. make you more sympathetic to Eve?
I also noticed clues that I’d missed. Eve’s estrangement from her parents and their obvious dislike of Nate.
FOUR: Who is the narrator in the prologue?
Several of you asked in comments, and it’s a great question.
I assumed it was Addie, and I think it was based on what she says and what happens later. To me, it sounds like she got left to dig by herself and is trying to hurry and finish. I think Jay stayed and helped Eve out!
FIVE: How can Addie calls Hudson for a ride home from the pumpkin patch, and then Eve call Jay for a ride the same night? Hudson and Jay are the same person!
I thought this was a great question, so I went back and made a timeline:
After school: Addie lets herself in, gets confronted by Eve, and hits Eve over the head. Nate arrives home and strangles Eve. They wrap her up and make their plan, which is to drop Eve’s car at the train station and then drive Nate’s car, with Eve’s body in the trunk, to a pumpkin patch.
Evening through early morning: Addie and Nate dig and dig and dig. This obviously takes some time. After the hole is finished, Nate vanishes. Addie waits a while, tries to contact him, finishes burying Eve, and covers her up.
Did Addie move Eve’s body into the hole by herself? Earlier in the chapter she watches Nate carry the body, thinking how big and strong he is!
3:00 am: Addie calls Hudson for a ride. He mentions tells her it will take an hour to get there to pick her up, and as she says he arrives 48 minutes later, so 3:48 am, and they head back.
During this time, Eve is (presumably) digging herself out of the hole.
4:30 am: Presumed time that Hudson drops Addie off. She mentions that fifteen minutes before he drops her, his phone buzzes, probably with Eve’s snapflash message mentioned below (so around 4:15 am.)
Almost 5:00 am: Jay calls Eve back (she says it was twenty minutes after she messaged him, so 4:35?). Then he has to drive the 45 minutes to get her, arriving around 5:20, and drive back AGAIN.
So yes, this is technically possible, though poor Jay spends over three hours driving back and forth from a pumpkin patch in the middle of the night.
Someone mentions in comments that Eve walked a bit to find a signal. Presumably she’d walk closer to home, but with no signal she could have walked in any direction. Still, I think the timeline works!
SIX: What did Hudson/Jay know about Kenzie’s relationship with Nate, and her own attempted murder?
First, Hudson picks up Addie from the pumpkin patch. She’s presumably all dirty and sweaty. Then, right after that, Jay picks up Eve from the pumpkin patch, Eve is probably even more bedraggled and covered in dirt. He can’t think this is a coincidence.
But Eve decides NOT to mention that Addie was involved in her attempted murder. She just tells Jay that Nate tried to kill her.
SEVEN: Some readers have said that they found all the characters pretty unsympathetic, if not terrible.
Nate: a serial groomer and sex abuser.
Eve: a bit quirky, like the main character in The Coworker. And I was laughing at the descriptions of how unattractive she was with her stringy hair and gangly limbs. And that she says she thinks Addie looks a little like her. But I had to give Eve credit for pushing through after being hit over the head, buried alive, then strangled.
Addie: lied about her teacher grooming her and got him fired, lies about her father’s “accident” (or murder.) I really wish her father’s “accident” had been explored more.
Hudson/Jay: did he know Kenzie was sleeping with Nate? He knew how Addie’s father died. Hudson feels underused in the story just to keep his identity hidden.
Did you think this was going paranormal, with the references to Edgar Allan Poe and the dirty shoes showing up after Eve was dead? I was getting “Telltale Heart” vibes.
What’s the deal with the Barnes & Noble Exclusive Edition?
It has a couple of chapters from a future book, The Boyfriend.
Then a Q & A with Freida where we learn:
Her favorite character in this book is “Jay” because he’s “ride or die.” I guess? He is nice to Addie even though she’s unpopular. And spends three hours picking up stranded women from pumpkin patches.
How Freida comes up with twists: the suspects are A, B, C, and D. But the killer has to be E. (Or “J” haha…)
What did you think? Though a fun read, The Teacher will not rank among my very favorite Freida McFaddens. What’s my favorite? The Wife Upstairs, which I will do a post about soon! What is your favorite of her books?
great summary! I’m still confused about the very opening of the book with the female digging a grave. Was that Eve or Addie? I thought Eve but they said something about “last time” she had someone to help her which led me to believe maybe it was Addie about her dad but they didn’t bury him.. Thoughts? Was it just Eve digging her husbands grave and Jay wasn’t there yet to help her finish it but he helped her start it?? Not sure..
Ooh, that’s an intriguing question. I have to admit I’m a prologue skimmer and I hadn’t even thought that there were two women who buried people!
I’m pretty sure the prologue narrator is Addie. She says “The first layer of dirt was almost impossible to break through … but I had a partner to help me back then.”
I think she is referring to the fact that Nate started helping her dig and then went off to get Eve’s purse out of the car and never came back. As far as we know, ride-or-die Jay stayed and helped Eve finish the job!
But if anyone has a different theory, let’s hear it 🙂
It is Addie. Agree.
How did Jay pick Eve up when he was the one driving Addie? It was an hour drive so didn’t seem to be enough time for him to get both.
Hi – I added a timeline in the post. There’s just barely enough time!
Personally I feel the Hudson/Jay angle, even though a “clever” reveal, doesn’t add anything to the story. I would have happily stopped the book pre epilogue. It made me sick to think that Eve was doing the same as Nate.
You are not alone in feeling uncomfortable with the grooming and abuse angle of the book. I am not generally a fan of those plots and I was a bit apprehensive. At first I thought Addie was going to be the villain (making up stuff) but then things didn’t go that way!
But Nate groomed Eve so Eve was all messed up. I feel she was traumatized by him.
So who was digging the grave in the prologue? Just read the second page of comments.
My vote is for Addie, since she mentions that it was getting harder, presumably after Nate abandoned her. But would love to hear what others think!
I’m confused with the Nate and Eve relationship line. She was so enraged he was involved with a student when that’s how she got him? Didn’t know what he was doing so late at school all the time? Seems a bit off. Also, she just turned 30, been married for 8 years but she was 15 when she started a relationship with him (as a student). So technically they’ve been involved for 15 years total?
Yes, I think that is what the book suggests. Until the end, I didn’t think much of the age difference and just assumed they got together when she was around 20 and he was around 30.
But I agree, with Eve’s revelation at the end, the book seems to suggest that they “met” when Eve was 15 and Nate was 25 and then got married seven years later.
That would fit with her getting married at age 22, after she graduated from college (which she’d need to do to be a high school math teacher).
If the book said anything about their relationship prior to marriage (like were they together all that time?) I missed it, so if it was there, someone let me know! Now I’m pretty curious, actually 🙂
It mentions it. The poem he wrote was for Eve originally.
But Eve did say an 8 year difference which I agree doesn’t make sense.
The Wife Upstairs is not by Frieda McFadden it’s by Rachel Hawkins
It’s both! Rachel Hawkins wrote a 2021 book with that title but
Frieda McFadden has a 2020 book with that title as well.
Both are modern gothics, but completely different books. McFadden’s Wife Upstairs is the one that some people think feels similar to Verity (2018) by Colleen Hoover, which is also a modern gothic.
I love all three books!
I think the math is a little off on when Nate groomed Eve; he’s 8 years older than her. So he was closer to 23yo when she was 15yo; still gross and inappropriate.
Also, after Eve dug herself up didn’t she say she had no service and had to walk awhile to finally get signal? However, Addie didn’t have to walk anywhere because she did have service. Therefore, Hudson/Jay would’ve picked them up at two different locations.
Lastly, didn’t Eve show Jay the picture of Nate and Addie kissing? I no longer have the book so I can’t confirm. And I don’t recall if she name dropped Addie as his student either. Either way, I’m kinda convinced Hudson/Jay didn’t know Eve and Nate were teachers at his school; they were on first name basis.
Thanks for your comment! I could not find Nate’s age in the book. Eve just says he’s a little older. To be her teacher, he’d have to be at least 6-8 years older for sure. I’m not sure where I got 40; I think it was someone else’s comment.
Yes, Eve did say that she had to walk a bit. Are you mentioning that for timeline purposes, or to argue that Jay didn’t know? I mean, picking up two women covered in dirt in the middle of the night, one after the other, seems connected.
Yes, I’d forgotten that Eve took a photo of Addie and Nate kissing. And yes, right after that Eve cries to Jay about her marital problems. I do think Jay knows who Eve is, because he gave her a fake name. But as far as I could find Eve does not show him the picture, and we don’t know if she told him who Nate is cheating with. But she does tell Nate she took a picture, and I think that’s why he decides he has to kill her.
i wish we had dug more into the characters Art, Addie’s mom, and her dad. Art says she’s dangerous? Why does he say that? And we hear Addie’s mom ages right before her eyes. Does she know Addie pushed her dad down the stairs? I felt there was character development missing. I also had to laugh that Eve and Nate only seemed to eat Italian pasta type meals any time food was mentioned. 😆
I agree with you and have been thinking about why this was included but not really incorporated into the story.
Maybe to make sixteen year-old Addie’s actions more believable? Has Freida McFadden had teenage main characters before? Not in the books I read, but I haven’t read every single one. Because Addie lied about Art (I think that’s why he called her dangerous, but do we ever find out why she lied?) and she and Hudson were somehow involved in her father’s death, it seems more plausible that she’d willingly participate in Nate’s murder scheme, because she’d covered up a suspicious death before.
If anyone has more ideas, I’d love to hear them!
I’ve read all her books and this is the first with teenage main characters. We never find out why she lied. Also Addie was found at Art’s house when Art and his wife were having dinner so that doesn’t make sense to me. Art needed a better lawyer.
lol Art got a bad deal for sure, but I guess Addie was believed.
Also when Eve tells
Jay that Nate is cheating she says she took a picture. Does she show him the photo and he puts together then it’s Addie?
I took a look and to me, it’s unclear. She tells Nate about the photo (which I think sets off his plot to get rid of her.) She describes crying on Jay’s shoulder about Nate’s affair but she’s summarizing her end of the conversation with Jay. I didn’t see anywhere she showed him the photo.
If anyone else found that and I missed it, please let me know!