I will admit to finding Patricia Highsmith only after The Talented Mr. Ripley became a movie, but I have been slowly but steadily buying her books used very since. Strangers on a Train is her first novel, and it is a remarkable one. Most first novels you read end up being iffy, with promise but that certain tinge of not quite polished prose. Strangers on a Train had so little of that feel that I struggle to even remember it. Mr. Hitchcock liked it so much he felt compelled to make a movie out of it and we know Hitch knows his suspense.

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A really good book. Enjoyed the whole Alfred Hitchcock-y feel (have not seen the movie though). It is quite a journey into the psyche of two men. Their thoughts to their words to their actions. Psych and Comm students will enjoy seeing theories and models come to life. Certainly makes me want to read other Highsmith books. ( )

While this book certainly has it's weaknesses, I feel it's worth reading for it's cultural impact. Obviously there's the classic Hitchcock film, as well as references/homages/ripoffs in countless other shows. Comparisons to Crime and Punishment is probably inevitable, particularly when one compares the detectives.

As with Crime and Punishment, though, the book kind of falls at the end for me. It ends rather abruptly for my taste, but I don't really know how else it could have ended.

While I do prefer Highsmith's other novels, I feel it's still worth reading. If I could give half stars, I'd probably give it a 3.5, but it's not quite to a four for me. ( )

I've been reading a lot of Patricia Highsmith this past year, and I have to say I was a little disappointed with this one, her first novel and still one of her most famous.

The premise is quite good. When I heard the basic plot summary, I thought it was going to be about two people conspiring together for mutually beneficial murders. That's actually not at all how the story goes, it's really more than one of the strangers (Bruno) is borderline insane, and not only does he do a murder without the other person's (Guy's) consent, he then coerces, blackmails, and basically haunts Guy until he commits the murder he imagines he's earned in exchange.

Bruno doesn't have any problem with what he's done, but a lot of the last third of the book is about Guy's conscience and how his deed weighs on him. The pace slows way down through these sections, and I found myself wondering where the story was going while Guy continued to deal with his guilt and the continued insistence by Bruno that the two are friends. I liked Bruno a bit for that, he was a very believable borderline crazy.

The investigations catch up to the two and then fizzle out, but I have to admit the ending was quite good, even if it took me forever to get through the large sections immediately before it. I probably would have liked it a lot more without Guy's lengthy diatribes about the dichotomy of good and evil within the self. It was still a good book though, a very enjoyable read, but just not as fantastic as everything else I've read by Highsmith. ( )