By Leslie Kendall Dye | Friday, October 17, 2014 - Off the ShelfWhat if someone wrote the inverse of The Great Gatsby, in which a social outsider beat the wealthy at their own game? Welcome to The Talented Mr. Ripley, by Patricia Highsmith. As the book opens, Tom Ripley is being followed. He doesn’t know by whom or why, but he’s scared. By the end of chapter one, we have ridden the arc that will replay through the entire novel:
Tom is pursued; Tom turns predator into prey. It is the 1950s. A Manhattan businessman wants to retrieve his playboy son from an Italian fishing village called Mongibello. Dickie Greenleaf has been loafing there for months, on his father’s dime. Rather than simply cut his son off, Mr. Greenleaf yearns to bring him home without conflict. -
More
No comments:
Post a Comment