Highsmith Biographer Pens Mystery
Biographer Andrew Wilson Writes Mystery Novel
The author of acclaimed Patricia Highsmith biography Beautiful Shadow, Andrew Wilson, tries his hand at writing a Highsmith-style mystery.
The new mystery by Andrew Wilson, The Lying Tongue, doesn’t disappoint. The author of the biography of the life of suspense writer Patricia Highsmith, has written a book in the tradition of the author whose life he researched for the well-known biography.
The Lying Tongue
In his fiction novel, Adam Woods, recovering from a broken romance and suddenly unemployed in Venice, finds the opportunity to become the personal assistant of reclusive author Gordon Crace. After writing one successful novel, the elderly Crase never wrote another, and refuses to even speak of his writing. While trying to uncover Crace’s secrets, Adam confronts his own true nature.
The Lying Tongue’s Subtle References to Highsmith Novels
Throughout the book, readers of Patricia Highsmith's novels will recognize several references to some of her novels. The Venice setting in itself is reminiscent of a Patricia Highsmith novel. Subtle and not so subtle allusions to Highsmith’s books are interwoven throughout the book. For example, on page 246 the protagonist hears an owl cry for no particular reason—The Cry of the Owl was the title of one of Highsmith’s novels. Coincidence? Probably not.
On page 268, Adam’s excerpt of the novel he is writing has to do with a dream in which he has dinner with his girlfriend who has jilted him. This passage is reminiscent of the Highsmith book, This Sweet Sickness, where a jilted lover buys a house and pretends the woman who rejected him lives there with him. He stocks the house with things she would like and pretends she lives there with him even though in reality she left him long ago and is happily married to someone else.
According to the description of Adam on page 276, Adam bears a strong resemblance to the young student ,Christopher Davidson, who Crace may have murdered. In Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley, Tom Ripley resembles Dickie Greenleaf close enough to impersonate him.
The LyingTongue’s Similarity to a Highsmith Novel
Andrew Wilson writes in a similar tone to Highsmith’s novels of obsession, mind games, and suspense. In the tradition of a typical Highsmith character, guilt takes Adam further and further to the edge of his own sanity. Anticipation of murder and murder of necessity thread through the plot, testing Adam’s limits, ambition, and sense of right and wrong. As in Highsmith's work, the sense of reality blends until it is difficult to know which character is seeing the truth and which is victim of his own delusions. The book works its way through a labyrinth of twists and turns to an unusual and satisfying conclusion.
People who enjoy Patricia Highsmith and Andrew Wilson's work 's works may also enjoy British mystery author Ruth Rendell.
