The Wife Upstairs

The Wife Upstairs is a 2020 standalone mystery/thriller novel by physician and author Freida McFadden. The novel follows a woman named Sylvia who takes a job as a live-in caretaker for Victoria, who is disabled after falling down the stairs. Sylvia is hired by Victoria’s enigmatic husband, Adam, whom she initially finds attractive, but as she grows closer to Victoria and finds her hidden diary, Sylvia becomes suspicious of Adam, his past, and his motives. As the secrets of the past come to light, the novel explores themes related to manipulation, secrecy, and isolation. McFadden is the author of over 25 novels, including the popular The Housemaid series and standalone thrillers like Ward D, One by One, The Inmate, The Boyfriend, The Teacher, and Never Lie. She is a New York Times best-selling author, and her books have been translated into over 40 languages. She won the International Thriller Award for best paperback for The Housemaid, and she is a Goodreads Choice Award winner for The Housemaid’s Secret.

This guide refers to the 2020 Hollywood Upstairs Press Kindle e-book edition, which varies from other available editions in that it leaves out a chapter between Chapters 26 and 27 and does not portray Sylvia and Adam as having a sexual relationship.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of death, graphic violence, physical abuse, emotional abuse, death by suicide, and pregnancy loss.

Plot Summary

Sylvia commutes by train from her apartment in Brooklyn, New York, to a potential job in Montauk, Long Island. She was fired from her last caretaking job after her client’s daughter framed her for stealing jewelry. She hopes that this new live-in job, caring for the mother of a man named Adam Barnett, will be a fresh start, especially since her relationship with her boyfriend, Freddy, has ended, leaving her unable to pay rent. A woman sits next to Sylvia on the train and eats messily for hours, annoying Sylvia. She begins to choke, and Sylvia gives her the Heimlich maneuver. The woman is angry at Sylvia and accuses her of assault. Sylvia is frustrated until the woman leaves.

Sylvia arrives in Montauk, and the handsome Adam picks her up in his BMW, impressing her. Adam discusses the job, and Sylvia realizes that she misunderstood the posting; she’ll be caring for his wife, Victoria, not his mother. Adam tells Sylvia that Victoria fell down the stairs and was severely injured. She now requires a lot of care. He wants Sylvia to take care of Victoria’s meals and spend time with her during the day so that she’s not lonely.

Adam’s large house is isolated and lacks consistent cell phone service. When she meets Victoria, Sylvia is shocked by how different she looks from the woman she has seen in pictures from before the accident. She has a large scar across her cheek and scalp and a blank look in her previously striking eyes. Victoria cannot speak well and is paralyzed on one side of her body. Sylvia introduces herself, but Victoria does not seem to notice. Sylvia meets Maggie, Adam’s housekeeper, who is vague about whether she knew Victoria before her accident.

The next day, Adam shows Sylvia how to puree food for Victoria’s breakfast and where the baby food is, which can be an easy replacement. Sylvia doesn’t want to feed Victoria baby food, but Adam promises her that it’s not bad. She feeds Victoria, who barely eats. Victoria manages to say the word “laptop,” and Sylvia confirms that Adam gave her Victoria’s laptop. Victoria then says “avocado,” but Sylvia does not understand what she means. Adam interrupts to give Victoria her medicine through her feeding tube, which she clearly hates, but Adam assures Sylvia that it stops her from having seizures. Sylvia leaves and finds Victoria’s digital diary, which is in a document labeled “avocado” in her laptop files.

Victoria addresses the diary to her future children and describes meeting Adam when she stitched up his hand, which he’d cut while slicing an avocado, at Mercy Hospital. She was working as a nurse practitioner and had friends in New York City but no romantic partner. She had a crush on Mack, a paramedic, but he had a girlfriend. Victoria and Adam hit it off immediately, and Adam took her out after her shift. They kissed, and their romantic relationship started off strong.

Sylvia finds Victoria’s description of Adam romantic, and she feels jealous. She and Adam grow closer, eating dinner together several nights a week. Adam tells Sylvia that Victoria was pregnant when she fell and that they lost the baby. Sylvia thinks about the end of her own relationship with Freddy. She got pregnant with her and Freddy’s baby when she was 16, and her father hated Freddy. When her father learned of the pregnancy, he brutally beat Sylvia, causing her to lose the pregnancy. He kicked her off his health insurance, leaving her with enormous medical debt. Sylvia and Freddy struggled financially until Sylvia told Freddy to leave during a fight. Recently, Freddy began texting Sylvia, begging to have her back.

Sylvia continues to read Victoria’s diary. Victoria and Adam were happy, and Adam extravagantly courted Victoria, though some red flags began to crop up. Adam had a temper, often becoming angry at the drop of a hat, which worried Victoria’s friends, especially Mack. Victoria moved in with Adam despite the concerns. Though he insisted on keeping everything separate and became enraged at Victoria for using his tube of toothpaste, Adam soon proposed to Victoria, and Victoria accepted.

Adam and Sylvia continue to grow closer, even almost kissing during a storm-induced power outage. Worried about betraying Victoria, Sylvia tells Adam that their relationship cannot move forward, which frustrates him, but they remain friendly.

Sylvia continues to read Victoria’s diary, noticing that Adam’s behavior became more paranoid, controlling, and abusive with time. At one point, Adam accused Victoria of having an affair with Mack and shattered her phone. He left, but he was apologetic when he came home, and in her diary, Victoria attempts to justify his behavior and her decision to stay with him. Sylvia is unsure what to believe.

Sylvia grows slightly suspicious of Adam’s behavior. Victoria keeps saying the word “nub,” which Sylvia deduces means “gun” after taking Victoria on a walk, where she points to a tree with a bullet lodged in it. Freddy comes to try to win Sylvia back, but Adam demands that he leave. Sylvia and Adam have a Thanksgiving alone after Victoria refuses to participate, and Adam claims that his parents are celebrating with his uncle.

Sylvia reads more of the diary. Adam left Victoria stranded in Las Vegas on their wedding night. Determined to make the marriage work, Victoria forgave Adam, even when he bought a house in Montauk without telling her. She gave up her job and her friends and moved, even though Adam’s cruelty and temper were only worsening.

Sylvia becomes more suspicious of Adam. Victoria is increasingly able to speak to Sylvia, urging her to take the gun from Adam. Sylvia is reluctant, as she doesn’t know if the diary accurately reflects reality. Sylvia finds Victoria’s medication and discovers that they’re antipsychotic pills, with nothing to stop seizures. Realizing that Adam lied, Sylvia stops trimming Victoria’s nails, and when Adam tries to give her medication, Victoria slashes at his face, drawing blood. Sylvia begins pouring the medication out instead of giving it to Victoria.

In the diary, Victoria details how Adam became more controlling, keeping her isolated from everyone, constantly accusing her of infidelity, and taking away her access to money while cheating on her with their gardener and cook, Irina. He even bought a gun without Victoria’s consent. Without agency, Victoria spent her days watching TV. She also discovered from Adam’s agent that he lied about his parents being alive; they died in a car accident. Though they were trying for a baby, Victoria was relieved that she was not yet pregnant. Adam even based his new book on his false perception of Victoria, writing about an unfaithful wife who was killed by her husband, which Victoria understood as a warning. Mack came to visit, and Victoria told him everything. He wanted to help Victoria escape, but Adam returned home from work early. He drove Mack to the train station and was strangely kind to Victoria afterward. The police later came to reveal that Mack had gone missing. After they left, Adam confessed to killing Mack and told Victoria that he registered the gun in her name so that he could frame her for murder. She later found out that she was pregnant, and she knew she needed to leave.

During the night of a big blizzard, Sylvia sneaks into Adam’s closet and takes the gun, putting it in a trunk in Victoria’s room. Maggie, the housekeeper, calls and convinces Sylvia that Victoria is the unstable one, implying that Victoria murdered Irina in a fit of jealousy. Sylvia researches Irina and sees that she’s missing. Sylvia then thinks that the diary is fake and that Victoria is playing her. She goes to Adam and confesses to taking the gun. They go to Victoria’s room to get the gun, but Victoria has it pointed at Adam. She shoots at him but misses, and when Sylvia tackles her, they fall down the stairs.

Victoria is dead, and Adam begs Sylvia to lie about what happened, not wanting to taint Victoria’s memory with her attempt on his life. Sylvia reluctantly agrees, but when the paramedics come and evaluate her, the paramedic mentions knowing Mack, whose real name is Glen MacNeil. He went missing, like Victoria said. She also kept saying “Glen head,” and Sylvia finally realizes that she meant “Glen shed.” When she looks in the shed, she finds Mack’s decomposing corpse. Adam sneaks up on her with the gun. He confesses to killing Mack and Irina, who had found out about Mack and blackmailed him. He killed his parents, which is why he lied about them being alive. He also pushed Victoria down the stairs on purpose because he thought she was pregnant with Mack’s baby. Before he can shoot Sylvia, Freddy—who has come to check on Sylvia again—hits him with a shovel.

Adam goes to jail, and Sylvia and Freddy get back together, working and pursuing their degrees in the evenings. Sylvia meets Maggie for brunch, and Maggie confesses to having an affair with Adam and helping him hide Mack’s body. She thought that Sylvia was also romantically involved with Adam and killed Victoria on purpose. Disgusted, Sylvia tries to leave, but Maggie threatens to tell the police that she killed Victoria on purpose if she mentions Maggie’s role in Mack’s disappearance. Maggie begins to choke, and unlike on the train in Chapter 1, Sylvia does not give her the Heimlich maneuver, leaving the restaurant.