An old-fashioned man of character, Conrad Taylor is executive vice-president of a eastern university who, after leading a satisfying and well-ordered life, finds himself suddenly on shaky ground, struggling to do the right thing in the face of crisis, confrontation, and opportunity. A Man in Charge is an intricate novel about the uncertainties of personal power and the discovery of its limits.

Secret Understandings is a vibrant and richly textured portrait of Shelagh Jackman, a book illustrator who learns to cultivate the loving and complex relationships in her life while struggling to be true to her own best self, even when calamity puts her to the ultimate test-and triumph.

Stephen Cooper, a middle-aged university professor who is suddenly utterly bored by his life, plots an intricate scheme with his lover. They arrange a spectacular forgery of a disappeared art relic, and in order to sell it, also craft new identities for themselves: together they become somebody else.

"We move inside Cooper's chilly satisfaction as he and his lover-accomplice bring off one trick after another in the identity switching necessary to their scam. . . . And we're also brought close to the pain and rage . . . of the women whom Cooper (incorrigible to the end) deceives."—Benjamin DeMott, New York Times Book Review

"An authentic and ingenious account of the ingeniously counterfeit in art and in life."—D. J. Enright

"This offbeat romp intrigues with its ironic probing of life values at the same time that it provides lively entertainment."—Kirkus Reviews

"An extended and absorbing mediation on the loss of integrity."—Chicago Sun-Times

"Witty, sophisticated and intriguing, this tale of a forger is the genuine article: an example of the art of suspense and the suspense of art."—Jack Fuller

"An entertainingly mordant psychological thriller."—Washington Times Magazine

Written with razor-sharp wit and keen psychological insight, this compelling novel explores the way people—husbands, wives, parents, children, lovers—use and abuse each other. Under the meticulously maintained social conventions of the wealthy Warner family lie more primitive impulses and desires. As each character faces a crisis, we start to see the fascinating ways in which they make moral choices.

"Philipson gives us a very believable portrait of a marriage. He also gives us no easy answers . . . and best of all, real storytelling." —Publishers Weekly

"This solid and serious novel emerges as not just an expose of what really goes on behind the well-groomed facades of the affluent, but a thoughtful exploration of character and the efficacy of moral action in forming and reforming it." —Jane Larkin Crain, New York Times Book Review

"A swift, no-fudging narrative by a writer it is always rewarding to rediscover." —Sophie Wilkins, National Review

"An extraordinary novel, fascinating, compelling, and totally disconcerting." —Fort Worth Star-Telegram

"Has the drama, intelligence and moral force of an American Howards End."-Cynthia Ozick