Monday, March 16, 2015

Strangers on a Train ~ Patricia Highsmith

Architect Guy Haines has the ability to achieve anything he wants in life – a successful career, a fantastic home, and a beautiful new wife……. but all this changes on the day he catches a train to Metcalf to talk to his estranged wife about a divorce.

On the train Haines is subjected to a very uncomfortable conversation with the wealthy but bored Charles Bruno, though when Haines reaches his destination he has pretty much dismissed Bruno as a harmless crackpot.  But Bruno sees this fortuitous meeting as the start of a very beautiful friendship ~ one that will come at great cost.

Bruno believes that he has the idea for a perfect crime, one that attaches no motive to the perpetrators, and which will secure each of their futures.  But Bruno’s careful planning doesn’t account for Haines having a conscience and the fact that there will be others who are determined to get to the truth.

Highsmith had me on tender hooks throughout this novel.  Her characterisations were excellent, I detested the smarmy alcoholic Charles Bruno and felt all of the emotions attributed to Haines.  The nightmare world that she portrays is unshakeable as is the persistent Bruno.  Living out his fantasies Bruno drags Guy, a once honest man, down into hell without the strength of character to make it back in one piece.

I did this one as a ‘buddy read’ with a couple of readers who I have connected with on Twitter.  All three of us felt the high anxiety of the storyline, and once we had finished we agreed that we needed something calming to read afterwards!

Hitchcock made a movie by the same name, but he detracted from the novel considerably and it is extremely dated by today’s standards.

Maxine