"The train tore along with an angry, irregular rhythm."
Review: What an amazingly well written, spellbinding, rollercoaster ride of a book! And for all the reasons I usually end up not liking a movie that is based on a book too!
Usually I try to read a book before I see the movie. So far my record is heavily sided with reading the book first, but if it's a classic such as Strangers on a Train, it bound to happen that I've seen the movie first. The same thing happened with To Kill a Mockingbird, but I'm digressing. Going back to this book, let me start by saying, except for the title and character names the book and movie are polar opposites! Oh, and the starting plot, such as the discussion that takes place between the "strangers" on the train (see what I did there?) is the same. And I think it's because of the liberties (or lack thereof) that Alfred Hitchcock took in directing Strangers on a Train, that I can love both equally and appreciate them separately without taking anything away from each other.
As you all may know, this is was a collaborative read between myself and Alaina. And because she has recently undertaken reading the hefty Game of Thrones as a collaborative effort with another college friend of ours, it might be a while before we endeavor to do another. Although I will say, her pick was so awesome this go-round that I'm inclined to entrust her with the next pick! With the caveat that William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back obviously be among one that we do soon!
After discussing our favorite Hitchcock films we promptly began dissecting the novel thusly:
Bruno's mom, to me, seemed to have a sort of Norma & Norman Bates kind of relationship going on. I always felt like there was something just not right with that mother-son dynamic. Then there was Guy's mother, who is there for her son, caring, nurturing, but more of a mother than a best friend.
Of course there's a bit more to the story, but the whole idea is what happens inwardly to both Guy and Bruno after murder is committed. To make one more analogy, that I just thought of now, Bruno reminds me of that dude in The Tell Tale Heart and how he would have behaved if that short story dragged out much longer.
This is the kind of book that should be used in some creative writing college course. Analyzed and torn apart for self-reflection. I think I would have enjoyed comparing Guy and Bruno as some sort of thesis.
Synopsis: With the acclaim for The Talented Mr. Ripley, more film projects in production, and two biographies forthcoming, expatriate legend Patricia Highsmith would be shocked to see that she has finally arrived in her homeland. Throughout her career, Highsmith brought a keen literary eye and a genius for plumbing the psychopathic mind to more than thirty works of fiction, unparalleled in their placid deviousness and sardonic humor. With deadpan accuracy, she delighted in creating true sociopaths in the guise of the everyday man or woman. Now, one of her finest works is again in print: Strangers on a Train, Highsmith's first novel and the source for Alfred Hitchcock's classic 1953 film. With this novel, Highsmith revels in eliciting the unsettling psychological forces that lurk beneath the surface of everyday contemporary life.
Usually I try to read a book before I see the movie. So far my record is heavily sided with reading the book first, but if it's a classic such as Strangers on a Train, it bound to happen that I've seen the movie first. The same thing happened with To Kill a Mockingbird, but I'm digressing. Going back to this book, let me start by saying, except for the title and character names the book and movie are polar opposites! Oh, and the starting plot, such as the discussion that takes place between the "strangers" on the train (see what I did there?) is the same. And I think it's because of the liberties (or lack thereof) that Alfred Hitchcock took in directing Strangers on a Train, that I can love both equally and appreciate them separately without taking anything away from each other.
As you all may know, this is was a collaborative read between myself and Alaina. And because she has recently undertaken reading the hefty Game of Thrones as a collaborative effort with another college friend of ours, it might be a while before we endeavor to do another. Although I will say, her pick was so awesome this go-round that I'm inclined to entrust her with the next pick! With the caveat that William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back obviously be among one that we do soon!
After discussing our favorite Hitchcock films we promptly began dissecting the novel thusly:
@NYCBookWorm84 Um, the major flaw being himself?? #TheCollaborators
— Alaina Patterson (@WillBeFunOrElse) May 1, 2014
No matter how you look at it, this book is an excellent guide on what could be the perfect crime of murder. Provided one of the two parties involved is not a complete and total schizo! I think Alaina would agree with me there?
@NYCBookWorm84 He was so obsessed with Guy that he endangered the both of them. #TheCollaborators
— Alaina Patterson (@WillBeFunOrElse) May 1, 2014
We seemed to have very little to say about the women in the book, of which there were four of! See, the main point to this suspense novel is that Bruno (the schizo) dreams of killing his father. He has come up with the perfect way of doing it where no one will get caught. How, you might ask? Simple. He'll meet a complete stranger, say, on a train. This stranger will, like Bruno, have someone in his life that, if they were eliminated, would make his life better. That's where Guy comes in. He's got a wife who also happens to enjoy fooling around on him, but won't divorce him. Guy wants the divorce so that he may marry Anne, a woman he actually loves and cares for deeply, and who, unlike Miriam, isn't sleeping around on him. The other two women are the mothers' of each of our main characters.Bruno's mom, to me, seemed to have a sort of Norma & Norman Bates kind of relationship going on. I always felt like there was something just not right with that mother-son dynamic. Then there was Guy's mother, who is there for her son, caring, nurturing, but more of a mother than a best friend.
Of course there's a bit more to the story, but the whole idea is what happens inwardly to both Guy and Bruno after murder is committed. To make one more analogy, that I just thought of now, Bruno reminds me of that dude in The Tell Tale Heart and how he would have behaved if that short story dragged out much longer.
This is the kind of book that should be used in some creative writing college course. Analyzed and torn apart for self-reflection. I think I would have enjoyed comparing Guy and Bruno as some sort of thesis.
Synopsis: With the acclaim for The Talented Mr. Ripley, more film projects in production, and two biographies forthcoming, expatriate legend Patricia Highsmith would be shocked to see that she has finally arrived in her homeland. Throughout her career, Highsmith brought a keen literary eye and a genius for plumbing the psychopathic mind to more than thirty works of fiction, unparalleled in their placid deviousness and sardonic humor. With deadpan accuracy, she delighted in creating true sociopaths in the guise of the everyday man or woman. Now, one of her finest works is again in print: Strangers on a Train, Highsmith's first novel and the source for Alfred Hitchcock's classic 1953 film. With this novel, Highsmith revels in eliciting the unsettling psychological forces that lurk beneath the surface of everyday contemporary life.
Strangers on a Train
by Patricia Highsmith
256 pages
W. W. Norton & Company, 2001
mystery / suspense
Read in 5 days
Rating: ★★★★
To learn more about Patricia Highsmith visit her Wikipedia page here.
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