This year’s Halloween Bingo buddy read — thanks again to Christine, BrokenTune and Lillelara for the fun of reading this book together! Somehow, that seems to be the way Patricia Highsmith’s books are enjoyed best … Though I have to say, while I struggled with Strangers on a Train, I’m getting a complete and total kick out of Tom Ripley. I mean, sure, he’s a psychopath, and it was slightly even more fun to watch him turn into the monster that he actually is in the first book … but it was still eye-rolling good fun to watch his antics in the arts world. (He also seems to be one of the notable exceptions to the fact that, as a rule, I have to be able to empathize with at least one of a book’s POV characters, see above. Which is a rule that of course also applies to Highsmith’s books — hence, in part, my response to Strangers on a Train — and c’mon on, you can’t seriously root for a psychopath … or can you?!)
LoL. Her characters are almost all horrible people, but you have to root for someone … even if it is Edgar and Hortense (the snails in Deep Water). 😉
Oh, Hortense too, definitely. — Do I really want to read Deep Water? No so sure about that … 😀
It was intense, but very worth it. I mean, the fact that I remember the names of the snails and quite a few details of the book definitely means it was memorable. The main characters were memorable, too, but they were utterly, utterly messed up…in a suburban American way.
The snails have names??? Lord help us.
Only two of them. ;D
Well … 😀