# The Altruists

Canonical: https://www.bookquiver.com/andrew-ridker/the-altruists/9781787330450

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- Book: [The Altruists](https://www.bookquiver.com/andrew-ridker/the-altruists) ([The Altruists.md](https://www.bookquiver.com/andrew-ridker/the-altruists.md))
- Authors: [Andrew Ridker](https://www.bookquiver.com/andrew-ridker)
- Publisher: Jonathan Cape
- ISBN: 978-17-8733-045-0
- Pages: 320
- Published: 2019-03-07
- Language: en_US
- Binding: Hardcover

## Description

''Reading Andrew Ridker’s debut novel, you soon realise you’re in the presence of a new talent.'' The TimesArthur Alter is in trouble. A middling professor at a Midwestern college, he can''t afford his mortgage, he''s exasperated his new girlfriend, and his kids won''t speak to him. And then there''s the money – the small fortune his late wife Francine kept secret, which she bequeathed directly to his children. Those children are Ethan, an anxious recluse living off his mother''s money on a choice plot of Brooklyn real estate; and Maggie, a would-be do-gooder trying to fashion herself a noble life of self-imposed poverty. On the verge of losing the family home, Arthur invites his children back to St. Louis under the guise of a reconciliation. But in doing so, he unwittingly unleashes a Pandora''s Box of age-old resentments and long-buried memories. Spanning New York, Paris, Boston, St. Louis, and a small desert outpost in Zimbabwe, The Altruists is a razor-sharp, darkly funny family saga from a sparkling new talent.