A fabulous and epic biography detailing the secret life and serious art of the amazing author, Patricia Highsmith.
Pat Highsmith lived a bizarre personal life, and was a prolific writer of fiction, journals, diaries, letters, and comics. Born in 1921 she grew up in Greenwich Village and was an out and active lesbian in the New York literary world of the 40s and 50s.
Two of her best known books became movies Strangers On A Train and The Talented Mr Ripley.
She openly loved many women but strangely wrote her one and only lesbian novel initially under a pseudonym. The Price Of Salt (later renamed Carol) was based on her own experiences and was considered her most personal work.
It was also said to be the first lesbian novel written with a happy ending, as up to that time lesbian characters had usually come to a sticky end so to speak, murder, suicide, or total rejection and loneliness.
She travelled widely, lived in Europe, was equally loved and hated, and deteriorated into severe alcoholism, but was always a charismatic, mysterious, and fascinating woman. A great read.