Rating: 
Summary: Hypnotic
Review: Patricia Highsmith is one of the greatest writers of modern suspense, and she has a genius for drawing the reader into the hypnotic, off-center world of her fiction. This book is slower than the movie, and doesn't have as many twists, but it's more convincing, and I found its ending more powerful. Ripley's a wonderful character, and it's great that he's getting a renaissance of attention.
Rating: 
Summary: Much better than the movie
Review: For all of you that have read the book, and seen the movie, you will probably agree with me:the book is better. Although the movie is very good, the book is a lot less predictable. Patricia Highsmith must of been a very smart lady, she has the a very interesting writing technique. Even though some parts on the book seemed to drag on, she continually made up for them with the next scene, it was like she made the reader think that the book was going to be boring, then she made it so suspensful and interesting that you were instantly hooked again. All in all it was very well written, suspensful, and very good!
Rating:
Summary: relentlesly disturbing. a great read
Review: The Talented Mr Ripley is about a virtual nobody who has numerous jobs. When he his asked by shipyard owner Herbert greenleaf to go to italy to convince his son Dickie to come home. So Tom Ripley does he gets so caught up in Dickie's lifestyle he will do anything to become him even kill if he has to. Written by Patricia Highsmith who went on to write two other novels about Tom Ripley. Highsmith constructs a murder mystery that is so disturbing that it literaly crawls under your skin and forces you to keep on reading. Even though Tom Ripley is a supposed to be a bad person but in the end of the book you really having sympathy for this lowlife. Anthony Minghella adapted this novel to a movie with Matt Damon as Ripley. All i can say the movie really follows the book. and that is alot more than some other adaptations.
Rating:
Summary: amazing
Review: The book is written very interesting, so that u almost can identify yourself at the beginning with tom. The caracters are well chosen. And I think also that the book is more interesting than the movie. In this book you can well see the improvement of his self-confidence which is very amazing to notice. All in all I have to say that this is one of the best books, we've ever read in our english-class.
Rating:
Summary: A astonishing story of an astonishing person
Review: After leading a rather unenjoyable life in N.Y. Tom Ripley gets the opportunity to travel to Europe for free. His contribution to his so called job is to persuade the son of Mr Greenleaf, a rich industrial, to come back to the States to work in his father`s business and to see his mother who is very ill. After finding Dickie Greenleaf and his female friend Marge, an american writer, in a small village near Naples, Italy, called Mongibello, he soon becomes a true admirer of the good looking and laid-back Dickie, who leads a life full of amusement and pleasure. Soon the reader discovers many talents in Tom Ripley, e.g. his extraordinary capability of observing and imitating other people. Not before long Dickie finds Tom in his room dressed in Dickie`s best suit. That`s the point when Dickie`s confidence in Tom takes a U-turn and Marge developpes the theory of Tom beeing a queer fellow. The relationship between Marge and Dickie becomes more and more profound, which makes Tom feels alienated and jealous. It would take me too much time to resume the whole story here, so I`ll just give my personal opinion: I think P. Highsmith really succeeded in opening a very complex character to the reader just by telling him about this character`s thoughts and feeling and his crimes off course. Reading the novell I somethimes caught myself feeling pity or even sympathy for a murderer, a rude and brutal murderer who kills of a rather surprising motivation: he kills people because he loves and adores them, he wants to be as close as possible to them. In fact he kills to be somebody. because before killing Dickie he is a real nobody!
Rating:
Summary: I've read this one story so far, but it is a great one...
Review: I did not have a chance to read other stories from the "Ripley collection" yet, but I like this one enormously. Patricia Highsmith was a great and a very talented writer. It is nice to see that now she is getting the appreciation she deserves. Better late than never. As a general rule, I do not like "suspence" genre, but this book seems to be much more than just a suspence story. It is much more complex than a typical "murder-fiction". You can read this book several times and every time you peel off another layer and discover something else. This story is timeless and limitless...
Rating:
Summary: An odd police story
Review: Mr. Ripley is a person who has the talent to imitate other people. He murders two men, takes the identity of one of them and lives for a while under this new name. What makes this novel special is that you understand the reasons of the murderer and you start liking him. At the end he isn't punished although he would deserve it. There are certain differences between the book and the film; we can recommend both. The book is easy to read and interesting. The film can help to understand and if you watch it you will feel like in the 50's. Just enjoy it!
Rating:
Summary: Mr Ripley: a mysterious character
Review: The beginning of the novel is quite slow, and also a little bit boring, because the real action and the tension appears much later. Reading the book was very strenuous because we could not get involved in the story a long time. It seemed you couldn't step ahead reading. There are several sub-actions that seem very long sometimes because of the amount of the details; the main action is hesitated. The author describes the characters very detailed, their feelings and thoughts are shown. The reader can feel that tension in the book appears several times, i.e. Tom Ripley takes the identity of his admired friend Dickie and gets confronted with Marge and Fausto, who know that he isn't the person he pretends to be, so the situation becomes very dangerous. Ripley's character is almost indescribable: He appears as a friend and a gentleman at the beginning, but during the story you can see that he is very egoïstic and cruel, if the situation forces him to act a cruel way. He is very genius in his role, that means he can handle situations very cool and smart, and if it was good luck he always acts the right way, so nobody notices what's going on. Sometimes the reader has to reflect and make a stop to be able to understand the development. It is very hard, because Ripley changes his identity several times, that's perhaps why the story becomes so complex at times. I dare say his character is schizophrenic and almost like a parasite. He lives an easy life in Italy grace of the money of Mr. Greenleaf and he even reaches to destroy the developing relationship of Dickie and Marge.
Rating:
Summary: Mr Ripley ¿ a fascinating murderer
Review: First of all we want to say that we enjoyed reading this novel very much. Already from the first page there is a certain tension that never disappears again. The most fascinating or rather frightening fact is that you really can identify with a murderer. This is because of the very exactly description of Tom Ripley, his behaviour, thoughts and feelings. Therefore he gets a very honest character at the beginning and you also feel pity for him (i.g. the way he passed his childhood). After the first murder it's almost impossible for the reader to hate him and so in a way you are guilty, too, 'cause you're sympathising with a killer. Another point which turns the book very interesting is the fact that the whole story is exactly planned but not impossible. You could say that this story really could have happened.
Rating:
Summary: A clever story about a schizophrenic
Review: We first saw the movie of this story, and so we were already introduced a little bit in the different persons and the actions. We think it's a very impressing novel about a very strange person called Tom Ripley. Patricia Highsmith succeeded in presenting us the character, the thoughts and the feelings of Tom. We were also fascinated by the clever idea of the novel. After Tom has killed Dickie, the story began to become much more interesting than in the first pages. Tom changed his identity, but he never lost the identity of Tom. He had to "jump" from one to the other persons, and he was very talented in doing that. Patricia Highsmith didn't forget a single detail in this game of lies and imitations. We think it was also a good end of the novel, when Tom travelled to Greece and let behind him all the problems and his fear. But we' are not sure, if Tom will be happy in the future..... Beni Schmid and Felix Widmer (our e-mail address for any feedback: hotbeni@hotmail.com)
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