Editors Reads Verdict
The finest Ripley novel — Highsmith's most morally intricate construction, in which Tom Ripley becomes the closest thing to a hero he ever manages, and the process of corruption is observed with devastating precision.
What We Loved
- The finest novel in the series by most readers' reckoning
- Jonathan Trevanny is one of her greatest secondary characters
- The moral inversion — Ripley as the nearest thing to a good man — is brilliantly handled
Minor Drawbacks
- Requires some familiarity with Ripley's established character to fully appreciate
- The Mafia plot is less interesting than the Ripley-Jonathan dynamic
Key Takeaways
- → Ripley's capacity for something like friendship — his most humanising novel
- → Corruption as a process observable in real time
- → The man who starts with a small transgression and cannot stop
| Author | Patricia Highsmith |
|---|---|
| Publisher | W. W. Norton |
| Pages | 288 |
| Published | January 1, 1974 |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Crime Fiction, Psychological Thriller |
| Difficulty | Beginner |
| Best For | Readers of the Ripley series; psychological thriller enthusiasts |
Tom Ripley is at a party in Fontainebleau when Jonathan Trevanny — a picture framer, English, polite, with the look of someone in quiet difficulty — makes a remark about Ripley being an American who lives in France and does nothing in particular. The remark is nothing. Ripley decides to destroy him.
Not kill — just destabilise. He passes Jonathan’s name to a gangster associate as a potential hitman: someone desperate enough, the suggestion goes, to kill for money. Jonathan has a blood disease, a young family, a struggling business, and no future he can afford. And so it begins.
What Highsmith does with this unpromising premise is extraordinary. Jonathan is recruited, carries out one killing, then another, and begins to change — begins, under the pressure of what he is doing, to become something he was not. And Ripley, who caused all of this for a trivial reason, finds himself interested in Jonathan, protective of him, doing things that are as close to decent as Ripley has ever managed.
Ripley’s Game is widely considered the finest novel in the series. It is also the one in which Highsmith comes closest to allowing Ripley genuine moral complexity — not good, never good, but capable of something that looks from certain angles like it.
Reading Guides
Frequently Asked Questions
What is "Ripley's Game" about?
Tom Ripley is insulted at a party by Jonathan Trevanny, a picture framer in Fontainebleau with a terminal blood disease, and decides to arrange a small act of vengeance: he has Jonathan recruited, through an intermediary, to carry out a Mafia killing on a train. Jonathan, desperate for money for his family, agrees — and Ripley watches, and then becomes involved in ways he didn't plan. Widely considered the best novel in the Ripley series.
Who should read "Ripley's Game"?
Readers of the Ripley series; psychological thriller enthusiasts
What are the key takeaways from "Ripley's Game"?
Ripley's capacity for something like friendship — his most humanising novel Corruption as a process observable in real time The man who starts with a small transgression and cannot stop
Is "Ripley's Game" worth reading?
The finest Ripley novel — Highsmith's most morally intricate construction, in which Tom Ripley becomes the closest thing to a hero he ever manages, and the process of corruption is observed with devastating precision.
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