The Disclaimer Book Ending Has A Gut-Wrenching Twist

Trigger Warning: This piece contains mention of sexual assault.

Disclaimer on Apple TV+ is based on Renée Knight’s gripping debut novel, and if the 2015 book is any indication, viewers are in for a twisty, chilling journey.

The series (which premieres on Oct. 11) stars Cate Blanchett as Catherine Ravenscroft, a woman who’s given a novel that she immediately recognizes as her dark, private past laid bare.

The titular “disclaimer,” referring to the part of the book that states resemblance to real life is “entirely coincidental,” is crossed out in red. It’s a threat — one that hangs over the rest of the novel, told in alternating perspectives between Catherine and the book’s vengeful scribe.

As you begin the new Apple TV+ series, here’s a recap of the Disclaimer plot summary and book ending.

A Disturbing Book

The aforementioned novel-within-a-novel is called The Perfect Stranger. It’s about an English woman, Charlotte (a stand-in for Catherine), who has an affair with a young man on vacation in Spain. Her 5-year-old son nearly drowns at the beach but is rescued by Charlotte’s paramour. The son lives, but the man dies.

Later, Charlotte is pushed in front of a moving train and dies.

Catherine is troubled when she finds the novel in her home, as she recognizes the story as her own — or at least, a version of her own.

The author is a man named Stephen Brigstocke. It’s his son, Jonathan, who died rescuing Catherine’s son in Spain 20 years ago. His wife began writing The Perfect Stranger before her death, and he filled in the rest, including the disturbing ending about Catherine’s murder.

Convinced that Catherine is the reason for his son’s death, Stephen tries to exact revenge by telling her secret to her husband, Robert, and now-grown son, Nicholas, about her past. He sends intimate photos of Catherine — collected from his late son’s things — and even befriends Nicholas online.

What Really Happened?

In the end, Stephen had it wrong. Catherine ultimately confronts him about the havoc he’s wreaked on her family and tells him the full story.

Catherine never had an affair. She was stalked and raped by Jonathan, a stranger, on a Spanish holiday two decades earlier. The day after the assault, Nicholas nearly drowned, and Jonathan died saving him.

Catherine never wanted to revisit the traumatic event, but Stephen’s interference prompts her to share the truth with her family. She decides to leave Robert — unable to forgive him for being more upset by her purported affair than by her actual assault.

With the truth of the ill-fated holiday finally out, Nicholas and his mother begin healing together. For his part, Stephen bequeaths his estate to Catherine as a final apology for his family’s mistreatment of her.