The queen of psychological suspense. Highsmith put you inside the mind of a murderer and made you root for him — a trick no one has pulled off as brilliantly since.
About Patricia Highsmith
Patricia Highsmith (1921–1995) was an American novelist who spent most of her adult life in Europe. She is best known for the five Tom Ripley novels — beginning with The Talented Mr. Ripley (1955) — which follow a charming, amoral sociopath as he murders, forges, and cons his way through European high society.
Highsmith's genius is her ability to create moral disorientation. You don't just understand Ripley — you like him, root for him, and feel complicit in his crimes. She manages this by making her victims less sympathetic than her murderers, and by writing with a cool, elegant detachment that refuses moral judgment.
She was championed in Europe long before America recognised her. Graham Greene called her "the poet of apprehension." Her work has been adapted repeatedly: Strangers on a Train by Hitchcock (1951), The Talented Mr. Ripley by Anthony Minghella (1999), and Ripley by Netflix (2024).
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The Talented Mr. Ripley
Tom Ripley travels to Italy to bring back a rich American's playboy son — and finds he would rather be Dickie Greenleaf than fetch him home. A masterpiece of psychological suspense.
Yes. The 2024 Netflix Ripley is a masterclass in adaptation, but the novel gives you direct access to Ripley's consciousness that the show can only approximate.
They are dark, morally ambiguous, and occasionally nihilistic — but never gratuitously grim. The pleasure of reading Highsmith is intellectual, not emotional. She is disorienting rather than depressing.
Strangers on a Train is the most famous. The Price of Salt (Carol) is arguably her most important work. Deep Water is the consensus best non-Ripley thriller among readers.
Highsmith published it as Claire Morgan in 1952 because a lesbian novel with a happy ending was commercially and professionally risky. She acknowledged authorship only in 1990.