The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of The Killer Inside Me
Book Review: A Bit Slow At First, But Great Anyway
Summary: 5 Stars
I got this book from my parents for my fifteenth birthday (yeah, my folks are a bit strange- they also gave me a book about the Weather Underground) and, by the end of the day, I had finished it. The first 100 pages were awfuly slow, but I pulled throw and read the rest. I am not disapointed. Although this isn't my favorite first-person murder novel (that would be "Double Indemnity" by James M. Cain) it's still a aonderful read.Book Review: A Detailed Study of The Sociopath
Summary: 5 Stars
Forget words like 'hard-boiled' and 'noir'. This is one of the finest studies of the sociopathic mind ever written. By using the interior monologue that Thompson is uniquely gifted to use, the reader is carried along on a wave of abject violence unlike any other in literature. It is truly a carnival ride through the fun house, except it isn't fun. The darkness is truly a revelation of character. Maybe the Killer is inside all of us. With Thompson's brilliant writing, it feels possible. This is the type of horror that Stephen King would be proud of.Book Review: A Killer Book
Summary: 5 Stars
After seeing the movie American Psycho (see this movie for Christian Bale's performance alone) I was interested in the fact that it was based on a novel. There really doesn't seem to be to many writers that are willing to put there story in the first person perspective of a serial killer so I checked it out. After reading that novel the only word that I could think of to describe it was tedious. I honestly could not have finished it fast enough and it is one of the few instances where the movie is much better than the book. However when looking at that book on Amazon I came across this novel and was surprised to see that it was written in the early 50's by a writer who became known as one of the best in the hard boiled thriller novelas. Intrigued I was so I bought this book and have to say that this was everything I hoped for and then some.
The stories protagonist is Lou Ford who is a Sheriffs Deputy in a small oil town in the early 1950's Texas. He is the son of a late and respected doctor of that town and everybody seems to like him. In fact really the only bad thing you can say about him is that he is boring as hell and a little slow. But nothing is what it seems and Lou is actually a cold, calculating sociopath who has been dealing with his "sickness" for fifteen years and just can't fight against it anymore. And after a behind the scenes meeting with a Union manager and a confrontation with the town whore the dominos begin to tumble as Lou plans to give into his sickness for the last time. Or is it? Where the story goes from here is quite disturbing and yet quite fun to read. It's like a horrible car accident. It's disturbing and scarring to view but for some reason you just can't look away.
This was my first Jim Thompson book and I can assure you it will not be the last. His writing is loose and readible and just seems to flow. He knows his character Lou so well you will begin to doubt his sanity. What's even more interesting is the fact that there are so many funny moments (or at least I thought they were funny) throughout this book. One minute I would be laughing my head off and the next I would be squirming from what Lou was doing next. Truly the sign of a great writer. To bad many contemporary readers have no I idea who he is.
All in all this gets my highest recommendation for any mystery / thriller fan or for anybody who loves to get a little scare before the lights go out (Stephen King fans will love Jim Thomposn).
Book Review: A Texas noir
Summary: 4 Stars
What's chilling about this guy is he's a sociopath and he knows he's a sociopath. Still, he can logically explain the reasons for each of his murders...until he can't anymore. The use of the first person is insidious, as the reader spends 244 pages inside Lou Ford's head. A few minor plot inconsistencies, but an amazing, sad, almost cinematic ending.Book Review: A Weed is Just a Plant Out of Place.
Summary: 5 Stars
Jim Thomson, in my case, seemed to come out of nowhere. I don't know for what reason and I don't know why now .. but I also don't think I want to know. In hindsight, I'd like to think it was fate. I remember sitting down in one of the bookstore's aisles, (mystery I suppose), trying to make the decision between purchasing Norman Mailer's most recent "opus" and Tom Wolfe's latest "era-defining novel," when something caught my eye. It was a flash of color, a bright shade of orange, which actually turned out to be the spine of a book. It was then that I read the title: "The Killer Inside Me." The title intrigued me even more and in a matter of seconds I placed both of the novels I had been holding on the shelf and took this short 'surprise' with me to the cashier.
Two days later, I had finished one of the most enjoyable, thought-provoking 'genre-books' I had ever read.
The story is told in the first-person narrative which heavily influences the suspense of the story. The main character is Lou Ford, a deputy sheriff in a small, middle-of-nowhere Texas town of Central City. The thing with Lou is that he is a sociopath...and more importantly, he knows he is a sociopath. To hide this "sickness", as he puts it, that he's carried with him since childhood, he makes himself appear bland, dim-witted, and his conversations are drowned in cliches. However, this sickness that Lou has tried so desperately to hide is about to resurface again, and the aftermath of this explosion inside him isn't very pretty.
The course of the novel is one that would better serve the reader if left unsaid by a reviewer such as myself, so I feel this is all I will reveal of the book's content.
I will leave you with this. There is a part within the novel where a character states, "A weed is just a plant out of place," and then adds, "If I placed a hollyhock in a cornfield, it would be considered a weed. But if I put it in my front yard, it's a flower. You get what I'm sayin'?"...and this affected me. How something so hackneyed and simple could strike a reader such as myself remains a mystery. But it did. The same goes for the story. Jim Thomson is an excellent writer and my sole regret is not finding out about his work until now.
True talent.