Rydal Keener is an American living the life of a flaneur in Greece when he spots a man sho strongly resembles his father. And so begins the fateful cat-and-mouse course of events for Rydal and an American couple on the lam in Athens. The narrative unfolds with plot twists and the inner machinations of the two men in what I can only describe as a sort of mesmeric style not unlike watching a car wreck happen in slow motion: You know it's going to be bad, but you can't tear your eyes away! Inasmuch as Shirley Jackson is the master of horror in her ability to inject psychological suspense into her stories (cf 'The Haunting of Hill House'), so too is Patricia Highsmith in regard to the thriller genre. ( )

Keeps you on alert for the next twist. Good story, greatly flawed characters. Highsmith is always psychologically scary. ( )

Started well, but crawled to a disappointing climax. ( )

From the book jacket. Athens, 1962. Rydal Keener is an American expat working as a tour guide and running cons on the side. He is mostly killing time, searching for adventure. But in Cheter MacFarland, a charismatic American businessman, and his flirtatious and beautiful young wife, Colette, Rydal finds more than he bargained for. After an incident at a hotel puts the wealthy couple in danger, Rydal ties his fate to theirs.

My reactions
The only book by Patrician Highsmith that I’ve read previously was The Talented Mr Ripley. Once again, Highsmith manages to give us unlikeable characters that behave in ways that just keep this reader enthralled and interested, turning pages to find out what twists, turns and surprises the plot has in store.

As with Ripley, Keener is subject to “thinking” not with his head, but with his …. Well, he reacts based on lust and desire. Why he gets involved with these two to begin with is a mystery to me. And he gets entangled in their mess to a greater extent than he ever dreamed possible. But “in for a penny, in for a pound.”

Rydal and Chester try to outmaneuver one another, always thinking two or three steps ahead (or not). They are both facile liars, but hardly a match for Colette. Frankly you can’t trust a word any of them says. But that only adds to the suspense. The ending was a complete surprise to me, and I can’t say it was completely satisfying.

Still, this was a fast and entertaining read, though I did have to remind myself of the time and place and recall how much easier it was to change one’s identity in that era. Apparently, there was a movie made around 2014, but I never saw it nor even remember hearing much about it. ( )

I really like Patricia Highsmith's writing, really. She manages to spin a sense of suspense out of almost nothing. This one left me a little flat, though. It starts out well enough. A con man, Chester, and his young wife, Colette, are traveling in Greece--waiting for things to cool off at home. A policeman confronts Chester in his hotel room and he accidentally-on-purpose kills him. While he is struggling to hide the body, he encounters a younger man, Rydal, in the hallway who has, in truth, been sort of tailing Chester because he reminds Rydal of his estranged and now deceased father. Rydal has a bit of a shady past too; he gradually becomes less sympathetic as the story winds on.

So Rydal, on impulse, helps Chester out with the body, and these three become entangled. Colette flirts with Rydal, Chester gets jealous--a nice, tense triangle is put in place. Then the main turning point of the story: Chester kills Colette while actually trying to kill Rydal. For me, this was where the story started to deflate. Without Colette, the suspense was gone, and as a character, I was much more interested in her than in either of the two men. Even though this is a short novel, the remainder seemed to drag on to what I felt was a fairly foregone conclusion.

Highsmith is a taut, compact writer. The exotic yet somewhat seedy setting is perfect for this type of story. It's too bad that it wasn't quite the story I wanted it to be. ( )