CHARACTER
Everyone Here Is Lying: A Novelby Shari Lapena

William Wooler

Dr. William Wooler

Quick Facts

Who They Are

William Wooler is the novel’s portrait of a man split cleanly in two: the “handsome and charming doctor” admired by his community and the frightened, impulsive liar hiding behind that image. His carefully curated persona lets him cheat, lash out, and then rationalize—until a single violent lapse exposes the gap between who he claims to be and who he is. He embodies the book’s fascination with Appearance vs. Reality: a man trained to heal who keeps inflicting harm, first with his hands, then with his lies.

Personality & Traits

William’s character is shaped by stark contradictions—professional poise masking private chaos, paternal love curdled by resentment, moral principles overridden by fear.

  • Deceitful: He sustains a secret affair, hides a burner phone, and lies to both Erin and the police about his movements the day Avery vanishes, making him the investigation’s focal point. His choices channel the corrosive logic of Deceit and Lies: once he chooses concealment, every step forward requires another fabrication.
  • Volatile temper: The “blind rage” he feels toward his “difficult daughter” erupts in a slap—a line he knows he can never uncross. He recognizes the violence as an echo of his own father, which deepens his horror and self-disgust.
  • Self-centered: Confronted with Avery at home when he wanted solitude, his first thought is selfish irritation—“For fuck’s sake…can he never get a moment to himself?” (Chapter 1). His affair similarly prioritizes his gratification over his family’s stability.
  • Guilt-ridden and self-loathing: Moments after striking Avery, he’s “horrified” and “sickened,” calling himself “a monster and a liar” (Chapter 3). The tension between his shame and his need to hide it illustrates the novel’s fixation on Guilt and Blame.
  • Cowardly: Terrified of consequences, he doubles down on evasions. He admits to himself, “He never knew till now what a coward he is” (Chapter 5), yet still chooses silence over truth.

Character Journey

William doesn’t so much grow as unravel. When Nora ends the affair, his sense of control collapses; he returns home raw and reckless, and his anger toward Avery explodes into violence. From there, every lie he tells to protect himself—about where he was, what he did, whom he called—tightens the noose, shifting him from respectable father to prime suspect. The investigation exposes his affair, alienates Erin, distances Michael, and jeopardizes his career. Though ultimately cleared, he ends the novel diminished and newly terrified: not of the police, but of Avery herself. His final recognition—that the family’s rot is deeper and more treacherous than he admitted—lays bare the story’s grim anatomy of Family Dysfunction.

Key Relationships

  • Avery Wooler: William experiences Avery as defiant and “challenging,” a perception that feeds his resentment and erupts in violence. Only after her TV interview does he fully grasp her manipulative acuity—too late to undo the damage he’s done or to trust his own judgment of her.
  • Erin Wooler: Already divided over how to parent Avery, their marriage collapses under the weight of his infidelity and lies. By the end, estrangement replaces partnership; even William’s love for his daughter becomes framed as a warning to Erin, not a promise of repair.
  • Nora Blanchard: William idealizes the affair as an escape and imagines it as true love, but the fantasy bursts when Nora ends it. That rejection triggers his worst decisions, and the fallout ripples through both households, revealing how selfish desires can detonate communal lives.
  • Detective Gully (and Bledsoe): Their interrogation is a steady dismantling of William’s fictions. As they confront him with evidence—the jacket, the timeline, the phone—William’s moral collapse becomes public record, forcing him to confront the wreckage he’s caused.
  • Michael Wooler: The investigation and scandal shatter the father-son bond. William’s lost moral authority leaves Michael with a disillusioned view of his father that professional status can’t repair.

Defining Moments

Even before the police suspect him, William’s fate is sealed by a chain of choices—impulse, concealment, escalation—that he can’t reverse.

  • The confrontation in the kitchen (Chapter 1): Reeling from Nora’s rejection, William argues with Avery and strikes her in a “blind rage.”
    • Why it matters: This single blow haunts every page that follows; it creates the guilt that fuels his lies and turns him into the perfect suspect.
  • The initial lie to police (Chapter 3): When Avery’s jacket is found at home, he could confess he was there—but chooses silence.
    • Why it matters: The omission commits him to a defensive posture; from then on, the truth itself becomes dangerous.
  • The confession (Chapter 12): Cornered by evidence, he admits to hitting Avery and to the affair.
    • Why it matters: His public persona collapses. What was once private shame becomes communal knowledge, severing trust with Erin and undermining his credibility.
  • The final realization (Chapter 50): After Avery is found, he tells Erin he fears their daughter and doesn’t know what she’s capable of.
    • Why it matters: The novel closes not on exoneration, but on dread. William finally recognizes that danger also resides inside the home.

Essential Quotes

Something inside him has snapped. It happens so fast, faster than conscious thought. He strikes her across the side of the head, harder than he meant to. She goes down like a stone, the expression of defiance wiped from her face, replaced by shock and then vacancy, and for a fraction of a second, he feels satisfaction.
— Chapter 1

This passage fuses violence with self-recognition: the “fraction of a second” of satisfaction exposes a buried cruelty he can no longer deny. It also sets the novel’s moral stakes—intent versus impact—and inaugurates his spiral into concealment.

He’s a decent man. A doctor, not a brute. He’s not his father. And he loves his daughter, he does. How could he have lost it like that?
— Chapter 1

William’s self-talk is both plea and verdict. He clings to titles—doctor, father—to excuse the inexcusable, revealing how identity can be used to launder wrongdoing rather than to correct it.

He knows that Avery was home today after school. She used the key under the front doormat to get in. He talked to her. He hit her. He’s a monster and a liar. He feels sicker by the minute; he’s afraid he might throw up.
— Chapter 3

Here the narrative strips away rationalization: he names himself “monster” and “liar.” The physical nausea underscores how guilt operates in the body, even as it fails to produce immediate honesty.

“What we’re seeing here, Dr. Wooler,” Bledsoe says, “is a pattern of deceit.”
— Chapter 12

The detectives articulate what the plot has already demonstrated: William’s problem isn’t a single mistake but a system of evasion. The phrase “pattern of deceit” reframes his behavior as habitual, not accidental.

“Erin,” her father says, “I love Avery, she’s my daughter—but I’m afraid of her. I’m not sure what she’s capable of. Just . . . keep your eyes open.”
— Chapter 50

The final note is warning, not absolution. William’s fear signals a shift from self-reproach to wary vigilance, acknowledging that the danger he helped unleash may now move independently of him.