hartereads's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
4.0
vamp1reslayr's review against another edition
The beginning was so exciting and interesting, but after the murder took place it just started to drag and I got tired of Guy's POV
bundy23's review
4.0
As a novella this would've easily been a 5 star classic but instead it gets padded out to 300 pages. Both leads are well written, particularly the alcoholic psychopath but everyone else is either a boring cliche or paper thin. The final page also sucked.
shelbs0721's review
1.0
This novel is SO BORING. The two main characters have all the personality of a pair of Old Navy 2/$5 flip flops. From their initial meeting and discussion to the actual execution of the crimes, everything is so unbelievable. The only "compelling" part of this novel is when the plot "compelled" me to put it down because I was so fed up and annoyed. I've only said this once in my entire life, but the movie was better!
yvo_about_books's review against another edition
2.0
Finished reading: August 14th 2021
“Death was only one more adventure untried.”
Spoiler
Guess what? It's unpopular opinion time again! Sigh. I've been meaning to read Strangers On A Train for quite some time now, as it's been referred to in a lot of stories, TV series as well as movies. The plot was already spoiled thanks to this, but I was still curious to see how the original story would unfold. I had high hopes for Strangers On A Train, thinking it would be right up my alley as I love murder mysteries and I've always liked the sound of the plot. Things started out promising enough, with the two characters meeting and the things leading up to the first murder. True, even then I thought things were to elaborated and wordy, and I was getting tired fast of the endless descriptions and thoughts of both Bruno and Guy... But things really went downhill after the first murder. Bruno is basically an alcoholic psychopath and the author does portray this really well, but I got bored of his endless ravings and increasing 'psychopathness' fast. The same goes for Guy; I really couldn't be bothered to read the endless details about what happened after the murder, his daily life and psychological decline as Bruno keeps insisting his part of the deal (that was never a deal in the first place as Guy never said yes). I confess that I started skimreading well before I reached the halfway mark, and I ended up being considerably underwhelmed by this classic. Definitely not one for me! Oh well, at least I can stop wondering about it now.
P.S. Find more of my reviews here.
fictionfan's review against another edition
4.0
The weak and the mad...
Guy Haines is on a train to Texas, hoping that his estranged wife Miriam will finally give him the divorce he needs so that he can marry his new love, Anne. When another passenger, Charles Bruno, begins to chat to him, Guy little thinks that this is the beginning of an odd relationship which will eventually spiral into murder...
First published in 1950, this is one of the early examples of what we'd now call “psychological thrillers”. Bruno has a difficult relationship with his rich father who controls the purse strings. He suggests to Guy that they swap murders – that Bruno will murder the inconvenient Miriam if in return Guy will murder Bruno's father. Guy tries to brush him off, but Bruno goes ahead with his part of the scheme. The thrust of the book is Bruno pressuring Guy to hold up his side of the bargain – a bargain Guy never agreed to, although he didn't explicitly refuse it either. We see the psychological effect on Guy and eventually on Bruno too, as the plot plays out.
Two things combined to give me perhaps overly high expectations of this book. The first is its stellar reputation as a masterpiece of the form and as an influence on later generations of crime writers; the second is Hitchcock's wonderful film adaptation, one of my favourite movies of all time. Having recently read quite a few of the books that Hitchcock adapted, I've realised that he often changed the plot almost out of all recognition, so I wasn't surprised to find that that's the case with this one too. While Hitch's story is of a good man hounded by a crazy one, Highsmith's version of Guy is of a weak and distinctly unlikeable character whose innate lack of moral strength is as much of an issue as Bruno's possible insanity. Oddly, it reminded me far more of Hitch's other great classic, Rope, in terms of the moral questions it poses.
Guy's inability to deal with the moral dilemma and subsequent descent into a state of extreme anxiety is done brilliantly, and the psychology underpinning Bruno's craziness is well and credibly developed. His unhealthy relationship with his mother in particular is portrayed with a good deal of subtlety – lots of showing rather than telling and, because we see it almost entirely through Bruno's eyes, it's handled with a good deal of ambiguity. However, the unlikeability of both characters made it hard for me to get up any kind of emotional investment in the outcome, especially as we don't really get to know the potential second victim, Mr Bruno, Senior.
Miriam is given more characterisation, but not much, and there's a kind of suggestion that she brought her fate on herself by her sexual promiscuity. But she's bumped off too quickly for the reader to develop any depth of feeling for her either way. Anne, Guy's new love interest, is a cipher for most of the book – there merely to give Guy a motive for wishing to be rid of Miriam and, later, to give him something to lose. For the most part we see Anne solely through Guy's eyes, as a kind of idealised opposite to Miriam, which makes her come over as rather passionless and insipid, and almost unbelievably trusting of this man that she clearly barely knows or comprehends (or she wouldn't dream of marrying him). In the end stages, we do get to see things from her perspective briefly, but she never really comes to life as a distinct character in her own right.
The writing is very good, particularly when showing Guy's increasing loss of grip on reality, but I found the pacing of the first half incredibly slow. Partly that may have been because I knew the story from the film, but the book seems to cover the same ground over and over again, with Guy angsting over his moral dilemma to the point where I didn't care what he decided to do so long as he finally did something! However, the second half seems to flow much better and the tension ramps up, so that in the end I was glad I stuck with it.
As you'll no doubt have realised by now, I'm not joining the legions of readers who have praised this unreservedly. For me, the unlikeability of the characters made it an intellectual rather an emotional read and, as I've said, the first half seemed to drag interminably. However, there's plenty to enjoy in it, especially in the later stages when it picks up pace, and it definitely deserves its reputation as a classic for its originality at the time. So I certainly recommend it, both as a good read overall and because it's always interesting to read a book that has been so influential on the genre.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
Guy Haines is on a train to Texas, hoping that his estranged wife Miriam will finally give him the divorce he needs so that he can marry his new love, Anne. When another passenger, Charles Bruno, begins to chat to him, Guy little thinks that this is the beginning of an odd relationship which will eventually spiral into murder...
First published in 1950, this is one of the early examples of what we'd now call “psychological thrillers”. Bruno has a difficult relationship with his rich father who controls the purse strings. He suggests to Guy that they swap murders – that Bruno will murder the inconvenient Miriam if in return Guy will murder Bruno's father. Guy tries to brush him off, but Bruno goes ahead with his part of the scheme. The thrust of the book is Bruno pressuring Guy to hold up his side of the bargain – a bargain Guy never agreed to, although he didn't explicitly refuse it either. We see the psychological effect on Guy and eventually on Bruno too, as the plot plays out.
Two things combined to give me perhaps overly high expectations of this book. The first is its stellar reputation as a masterpiece of the form and as an influence on later generations of crime writers; the second is Hitchcock's wonderful film adaptation, one of my favourite movies of all time. Having recently read quite a few of the books that Hitchcock adapted, I've realised that he often changed the plot almost out of all recognition, so I wasn't surprised to find that that's the case with this one too. While Hitch's story is of a good man hounded by a crazy one, Highsmith's version of Guy is of a weak and distinctly unlikeable character whose innate lack of moral strength is as much of an issue as Bruno's possible insanity. Oddly, it reminded me far more of Hitch's other great classic, Rope, in terms of the moral questions it poses.
Guy's inability to deal with the moral dilemma and subsequent descent into a state of extreme anxiety is done brilliantly, and the psychology underpinning Bruno's craziness is well and credibly developed. His unhealthy relationship with his mother in particular is portrayed with a good deal of subtlety – lots of showing rather than telling and, because we see it almost entirely through Bruno's eyes, it's handled with a good deal of ambiguity. However, the unlikeability of both characters made it hard for me to get up any kind of emotional investment in the outcome, especially as we don't really get to know the potential second victim, Mr Bruno, Senior.
Miriam is given more characterisation, but not much, and there's a kind of suggestion that she brought her fate on herself by her sexual promiscuity. But she's bumped off too quickly for the reader to develop any depth of feeling for her either way. Anne, Guy's new love interest, is a cipher for most of the book – there merely to give Guy a motive for wishing to be rid of Miriam and, later, to give him something to lose. For the most part we see Anne solely through Guy's eyes, as a kind of idealised opposite to Miriam, which makes her come over as rather passionless and insipid, and almost unbelievably trusting of this man that she clearly barely knows or comprehends (or she wouldn't dream of marrying him). In the end stages, we do get to see things from her perspective briefly, but she never really comes to life as a distinct character in her own right.
The writing is very good, particularly when showing Guy's increasing loss of grip on reality, but I found the pacing of the first half incredibly slow. Partly that may have been because I knew the story from the film, but the book seems to cover the same ground over and over again, with Guy angsting over his moral dilemma to the point where I didn't care what he decided to do so long as he finally did something! However, the second half seems to flow much better and the tension ramps up, so that in the end I was glad I stuck with it.
As you'll no doubt have realised by now, I'm not joining the legions of readers who have praised this unreservedly. For me, the unlikeability of the characters made it an intellectual rather an emotional read and, as I've said, the first half seemed to drag interminably. However, there's plenty to enjoy in it, especially in the later stages when it picks up pace, and it definitely deserves its reputation as a classic for its originality at the time. So I certainly recommend it, both as a good read overall and because it's always interesting to read a book that has been so influential on the genre.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
sarahsg's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
katescholastica's review
4.0
Patricia Highsmith is quickly becoming my favorite author — definitely a good place to turn if you want to read a book in one sitting and be unable to put it down the entire time
pharmdad2007's review
3.0
Interesting book about two "perfect murders"... Until they aren't. Reminiscent of Agatha Christie with a bit more bite and nastiness.
eastnaught's review
4.0
literally just this:
this novel was so, soo, sooo close to being perfect. I couldn't stop thinking about it since the day I started it. and okay, maybe watching too much Hannibal has turned me into a weirdo with no moral compass, BUT this should've ended on a better note.
I originally wanted to watch the Hitchcock movie because it's considered one of the earlier movies featuring gay characters, but hearing that it was based on a book, i knew i had to read it. and you know what? this IS pretty gay.
Now it's definitely not said out loud in the story (even though I'd like to believe Patricia Highsmith peppered the word "gay" so many times to refer to happiness as a hint, considering she is a lesbian legend who wrote Carol and many queer books such as The Talented Mr Ripley), it's definitely a gay story. Many times Bruno, who is our local murderer/psychopath, expresses that he is in love with Guy, and that he killed because of his overwhelming love. It's also repeatedly said that he has never enjoyed having emotional or sexual relations with women, and that aside from his mom, he's never loved a woman. And I'm not even mentioning all the times he fantasizes about killing Anne so that Guy could be his and his only.
Either way, this story? gay ✔
this also made me realize how easy it is to set someone up and manipulate them into doing something you want (in this case, murder). it's genuinely terrifying, and reminded me of Hannibal. The whole thing is just homoerotic murder husbands and that's exactly like Hannibal, so you see why I had better expectations for the ending.
Unfortunately I got spoiled about the ending through one of my wikipedia deep dives, and I've just been disappointed since.
Lastly, alongside many other fictional sons (e.g. Hannibal, Loki, Frank Castle, Jason Todd, etc.) I have now adopted Charles Bruno as one of my murderous sons. He is precious and naive and very smart, and so I will advocate on his behalf for as long as I can.
this novel was so, soo, sooo close to being perfect. I couldn't stop thinking about it since the day I started it. and okay, maybe watching too much Hannibal has turned me into a weirdo with no moral compass, BUT this should've ended on a better note.
I originally wanted to watch the Hitchcock movie because it's considered one of the earlier movies featuring gay characters, but hearing that it was based on a book, i knew i had to read it. and you know what? this IS pretty gay.
Now it's definitely not said out loud in the story (even though I'd like to believe Patricia Highsmith peppered the word "gay" so many times to refer to happiness as a hint, considering she is a lesbian legend who wrote Carol and many queer books such as The Talented Mr Ripley), it's definitely a gay story. Many times Bruno, who is our local murderer/psychopath, expresses that he is in love with Guy, and that he killed because of his overwhelming love. It's also repeatedly said that he has never enjoyed having emotional or sexual relations with women, and that aside from his mom, he's never loved a woman. And I'm not even mentioning all the times he fantasizes about killing Anne so that Guy could be his and his only.
Either way, this story? gay ✔
this also made me realize how easy it is to set someone up and manipulate them into doing something you want (in this case, murder). it's genuinely terrifying, and reminded me of Hannibal. The whole thing is just homoerotic murder husbands and that's exactly like Hannibal, so you see why I had better expectations for the ending.
Unfortunately I got spoiled about the ending through one of my wikipedia deep dives, and I've just been disappointed since.
Spoiler
I think deep inside I wanted Bruno to completely get away with the murder and for Guy to come around and accept it since we saw many times that he started to believe he had had it in him all along. Again, I was expecting a Hannibal-style story where yes, one convinces the other that he's capable of murder, but they both eventually come along and accept the fact that they are complicit in a joint murder case. Like I get it, it's probably morally better if Bruno just dies and Guy accidentally confesses (which was very underwhelming and sloppily written, but that's another story), however it's not very exciting or refreshing, and dismisses all the psychological character development that had happened.Lastly, alongside many other fictional sons (e.g. Hannibal, Loki, Frank Castle, Jason Todd, etc.) I have now adopted Charles Bruno as one of my murderous sons. He is precious and naive and very smart, and so I will advocate on his behalf for as long as I can.