Editors Reads Verdict
The most unusual Ripley novel — a meditation on guilt, fatherhood, and Ripley's unexpected capacity for care, set across an evocative divided Berlin.
What We Loved
- The most humanising of the Ripley novels after Ripley's Game
- The Berlin setting in the 1970s is vividly rendered
- The father-son dynamic between Ripley and Frank is genuinely moving
Minor Drawbacks
- The kidnapping plot is less compelling than the character study
- Ripley's sentimentality feels slightly off-note to some readers
Key Takeaways
- → Ripley's closest approach to genuine paternal feeling
- → Berlin as a city of moral ambiguity that suits Ripley perfectly
- → Guilt as something Ripley can teach a younger person to manage
| Author | Patricia Highsmith |
|---|---|
| Publisher | W. W. Norton |
| Pages | 288 |
| Published | January 1, 1980 |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Crime Fiction, Psychological Thriller |
| Difficulty | Intermediate |
| Best For | Readers of the Ripley series |
A boy of sixteen appears at Belle Ombre one evening: Frank Pierson, American, with the kind of face that betrays too much, asking to speak to Tom Ripley. Frank’s father — a millionaire food-industry magnate — fell from his wheelchair on a clifftop path. Frank pushed him. He has come to the only person he could think of who would understand.
Ripley takes the boy to Berlin. He doesn’t quite know why — something about Frank interests him, something about the nature of Frank’s guilt, which is real and corrosive in a way Ripley’s own has never been. They attend clubs in the transvestite scene of 1970s West Berlin; Frank, in women’s clothing, seems briefly free. Then there is a kidnapping, and Ripley must work out how much he is willing to risk for a boy he has known for weeks.
The Boy Who Followed Ripley is the most tender novel in the series — the one in which Highsmith allows Ripley something closest to genuine paternal love, and where his capacity to function as a kind of guardian to the guilty makes more psychological sense than anywhere else. Berlin, divided and strange, is the perfect city for it.
Reading Guides
Frequently Asked Questions
What is "The Boy Who Followed Ripley" about?
A sixteen-year-old American boy, Frank Pierson, appears at Tom Ripley's door in France claiming to have pushed his wheelchair-bound millionaire father off a cliff. Ripley, intrigued, takes the boy under his wing and accompanies him to Berlin — where they attend transvestite clubs in West Berlin, encounter kidnappers, and where Ripley must decide how much he cares about what happens to this strange, guilty young man.
Who should read "The Boy Who Followed Ripley"?
Readers of the Ripley series
What are the key takeaways from "The Boy Who Followed Ripley"?
Ripley's closest approach to genuine paternal feeling Berlin as a city of moral ambiguity that suits Ripley perfectly Guilt as something Ripley can teach a younger person to manage
Is "The Boy Who Followed Ripley" worth reading?
The most unusual Ripley novel — a meditation on guilt, fatherhood, and Ripley's unexpected capacity for care, set across an evocative divided Berlin.
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