Rete Bibliotecaria della Provincia di Como

Abstract: On the face of it, there was no reason to believe that Hannah and Humphrey Drayton were not happy and content in their marriage. However, all was not as it appeared on the surface, and after years of tyranny and loneliness Hannah finally decided that she could no longer bear this stuffy City broker. The only relief she had from his overbearing company was his absence on a Thursday evening, when he played bridge with a group of acquaintances, and at most weekends, which he told her he spent with elderly relatives who had brought him up after his parents died. In despair, and despite Humphrey's ridicule, Hannah had taken refuge in her writing, and it was a visit to the office of a publisher that was to change her life. There she met David Craventon, a man she was soon to think of as her Thursday friend. Taking advantage of Humphrey's absences, she and David would meet and talk and visit the theatre or the cinema, activities she had never enjoyed with her husband. At first Humphrey knew nothing of Hannah's 'other life', being preoccupied with protecting what he regarded as his future interests. And even when he became aware that she was seeing someone else, his thoughts of revenge were hamstrung by a secret of his own. Then an event occurred that was to destroy, at a stroke, all his prospects, causing him to plan a bitter retaliation for what he regarded as his wife's betrayal. As for Hannah, her Thursday friend was to become the saviour of her very existence - but would he manage to resolve his own not inconsiderable personal difficulties and offer Hannah the happiness she craved? With its deceptively simple theme, The Thursday Friend is a remarkable novel, one which displays Catherine Cookson's consummate ability to explore human relationships.