3 out of 5

Jesus, thank god I finished reading this.  Remember the Ripley books?  Highsmith exploring her character over a few decades, learning more about the way he manipulates others, himself; his feelings about the world, about life and death and love.  Generally those feelings would get him mixed up in something or other that would then take up about 100 pages of plot and 150 pages of Highsmith talking about Europe.  But occasionally she would find the right blend of free-flowing narrative and action to actually generate tension.  Written in the earlier part of her career, ‘Those Who Walk Away’ can be seen as a prototype for the Ripley books that would follow: split Tom’s uncanny ability to get into the minds of those around him – to live through them – and his impulsive side – which would often lead to crime – and you have the two main characters in ‘Walk,’ Ray Garrett, eventual art dealer (he’s trying to open a gallery), who’s young wife has recently committed suicide, and Edward Coleman, father of Ray’s wife, who loathes Ray for, as he sees it, ruining the life of this girl of whom he’s carried an ideal mental picture.

Highsmith starts things on a fun note, with Ray and Ed having dinner together, and Ray hinting to us that he can tell Ed hates him… and then after dinner, Coleman brandishes a gun and takes a shot at Ray, nicking him in the arm.  Patricia plays out the mystery of why this happened for quite a while, getting us used to Ray’s way of processing everything in something of a dream state, such that he doesn’t feel any resultant anger toward Edward, but rather some odd kind of pity… and eventually the pieces come into place via random thoughts and further conversations, though we’re still left to wonder what could enrage Coleman so much.  So Highsmith explores Ray’s feelings… about a neighbor with whom he didn’t have an affair but could have, about his wife, whom he loved but felt had an undeveloped grasp of the world, and about his guilt about his own growth as a person, perhaps stunted by being born into money.  Are we supposed to doubt Ray’s accounts?  If so, it doesn’t come across.  Rays words and actions come across as too genuine – and to Highsmith’s credit, as things escalate and Coleman makes further attempts on Ray’s life, we understand our main character enough to believe his non-retaliative responses – and Coleman’s as far too aggressive.  These are two distinct sides of a coin, though both, la dee da, not really dealing with the issues, in their own non-dealing ways.  Ray is always trying to explain himself, and Coleman is always expecting the world to follow the path he paves.

This works for about half the book, but then… like the majority of the Ripley books, you get that its not going anywhere.  There will be further murder attempts, perhaps, further contemplations, and certainly further overly-specific descriptions of European streets and locations because Highsmith must’ve loved it there.  But once she sets the pieces in place of emotions she wants to explore, she doesn’t really take them to any endpoint, but rather lets them tire themselves and fizzle out.  For the main crux of the story, Ray has ‘walked away,’ – gone into hiding after one of Coleman’s attempts – and Patricia tries to swing through the book’s slump by reversing roles at one point, a scuffle during which Ray finally fights back resulting in him, ahem, walking away from an unconscious Coleman… or is he dead?…  but then this tension is completely fucked (as is the narrative flow) when the next chapter is from Coleman’s point of view.  There are a couple of chapters late in the book that switch to his perspective, and frankly, it just comes across as filler at that point, to get us over the 200 page mark.

If I may, I marked some passages that I feel summarize everything about Highsmith.

Regarding her writing style: “A dog barked in the backyard of a house next door.  It was tied up, Coleman knew, because he had seen it from his window.”  Gawrsh.  THAT needed two sentences.

Regarding her general view of the world, from Ray’s naive perspective: “…the right thing to do was to direct one’s ego to recipients other than people, or to people from whom one expected nothing.”

And from Coleman’s cynical perspective: “Mourning was for… close families whose mourning was mainly for the rest of the living family to see.”

There.  Done.  You’ve read all her books.

But look there – three stars.  Because there ARE good ideas here, and an obvious intelligence willing to play around with concepts, and despite my picking on her… roundabout way of detailing something, they are certainly well written, and you get an absolute sense of character from everyone.  But the books of Highsmith’s I’ve read are like travelogues that stumble into murders.  They’re not all that satisfying as thrillers.  We talk about those garish events for a bit, but man, did you see that cafe over there?  So darling…