Reviews tagging 'Racism'

Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith

2 reviews

elizmoe's review

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

men will literally kill a stranger’s wife and then stalk the stranger until he has no choice but to commit murder too and then be super fucking weird about it until they’re both either dead or arrested, instead of going to therapy

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i mostly read this as a precursor to Carol/The Price of Salt in an attempt to understand Highsmith as a writer before I (finally) read the seminal twentieth century lesbian novel.

This book feels like something i would have read in AP Lit and then argued about a lot with my teacher. 

I also learned that maybe I like the idea of noir more than I like it in practice, and that perhaps this novel really isn’t for me.

Last but certainly not least, Bruno being clearly gay in the most unflattering and downright disturbing way possible really put me off this book. 

much more to unpack in this novel, but i don’t think i want to!
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sarah984's review against another edition

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dark tense slow-paced
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

There were some interesting ideas here, with the way that the two men kind of orbited around each other, and the inevitability of their downfall. The premise and idea of the murders interested me as well, but both characters were so annoying and made such stupid post-murder decisions that it was hard to sustain interest for the length of the book. This might have fared better as a short story.
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