Review: Those Who Walk Away by Patricia Highsmith

2.5 stars for Those Who Walk Away by Patricia Highsmith.

I cannot remember how I came to add this book onto my reading list. But I do remember why the book captures my attention enough for me to add it to my ever-growing list of books. The story revolves around two men and to a certain extent, a woman. Both men are related to the woman, one is the father, the other, the husband. Here comes the interesting part - the woman is dead, and the father accuses the husband of murdering his daughter. Now, the million-dollar question is, is the father right in his accusation? Or is the husband innocent? The only way to find out is to, well, read the book.

The book is about friendship, forgiveness, managing grief and moving on after a death. I will say it is not a story I enjoy reading thoroughly. Perhaps because I already have some ideas on the overall plot, I find myself forming certain expectations based on what little I know, and when those expectations are not met, I am disappointed. Or perhaps this story is just too direct to the point of uneventful. There is pretty much nothing fanciful or exciting in the plot development, instead, an overdose of nitty gritty details.

Those Who Walk Away has been on my list for at least 3 years. Now I am simply glad to have finally read it and to walk away (or rather, strike it off my reading list). For those who love simplicity and ambiguity in a story, well, this may be the book for you.


Publisher: Virago; paperback / softback edition
Publication date: 6 Nov 2014

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The honeymoon is over, as they say, the bride dead by her own hand. Ray Garrett, the grieving husband, convinces the police in Rome of his innocence, but not his thuggish father-in-law, an American painter named Ed Coleman, who shoots him at point-blank range and leaves him for dead. Ray survives, however, and follows Coleman to Venice, where the two fall into an eerie game of cat-and-mouse—Coleman obsessed with vengeance and Ray equally insistent on clearing his conscience, though each is at once the hunter and the hunted in a duel composed of tension, hiding, and guessing, and at times punctuated by violence that, even as each manages to walk away, draws them nearer to death.

*Blurb from Goodreads*

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