Thursday, October 17, 2013

Eight books to change a villain

Some very twisted characters populate our favorite books.

At The Barnes & Noble Book Blog Melissa Albert highlighted eight fictional villains and recommended books that might have sorted them out. One entry on the list:
Tom Ripley [of The Talented Mr. Ripley and sequels]: Eat, Pray, Love.

Fiction’s most adaptable sociopath is a magpie of human behavior, stealing the bits he can use to “pass” in whatever company he’s running with. But who’s the real Ripley? I’m hoping this book will send him on a much-needed journey of self-discovery.
Read about the other entries on the list.

Eat, Pray, Love is among Jill Halfpenny's six best books, Deborah Batterman's six books with three word titles,  and Sophie Thompson's six best books.

The Talented Mr Ripley is on Koren Zailckas's list of eleven of literature's more evil characters, Alex Berenson's five best list of books about Americans abroad John Mullan's list of ten of the best examples of rowing in literature, Tana French's top ten maverick mysteries list, the Guardian's list of the 50 best summer reads ever, the Telegraph's ultimate reading list, and Francesca Simon's top ten list of antiheroes.

--Marshal Zeringue