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The Grifters Audiobook
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(4.00) - 3,483 listener ratings
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Publisher Description
Jim Thompson's classic The Grifters is one of the best novels ever written about the art of the con, an ingeniously crafted story of deception and betrayal that was the basis for the critically acclaimed film by Stephen Frears and Martin Scorcese.
To his friends, to his coworkers, and even to his mistress Moira, Roy Dillon is an honest hardworking salesman. He lives in a cheap hotel just within his pay bracket. He goes to work every day. He has hundreds of friends and associates who could attest to his good character.
Yet, hidden behind three gaudy clown paintings in Roy's pallid hotel room, sits fifty-two thousand dollars — the money Roy makes from his short cons, his "grifting." For years, Roy has effortlessly maintained control over his house-of-cards life — until the simplest con goes wrong, and he finds himself critically injured and at the mercy of the most dangerous woman he ever met: his own mother.
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"Simple but effective. Sure, everything's spelled out for you, and pages fly by, but it's a fun way to spend an afternoon. And I found myself quite fascinated with the places Roy et al ended up eating - train cars, drugstores, etc... Going for another Thompson toute de suite."
— Brian (5 out of 5 stars)
Quotes
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The best suspense writer going, bar none.
— The New York Times -
My favorite crime novelist-often imitated but never duplicated.
— Stephen King -
If Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett and Cornell Woolrich would have joined together in some ungodly union and produced a literary offspring, Jim Thompson would be it...His work...casts a dazzling light on the human condition.
— Washington Post -
Like Clint Eastwood's pictures it's the stuff for rednecks, truckers, failures, psychopaths and professors ... one of the finest American writers and the most frightening, [Thompson] is on best terms with the devil. Read Jim Thompson and take a tour of hell.
— The New Republic -
The master of the American groin-kick novel.
— Vanity Fair -
The most hard-boiled of all the American writers of crime fiction.
— Chicago Tribune
The Grifters Listener Reviews
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Felix Godward, 3/9/2022
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sez Jooste, 8/17/2021
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" I didn't like this story at all. It could be because I read it over the course of a couple of weeks at various doctor's appointments, so there was some anxiety happening already, but it was just...depressing and not cool. I really wanted more--I felt like there were entire characters who did nothing, who were never fleshed out past one depressing episode, and others who we got WAY TOO MUCH about. Ugh. "
— Christine, 2/12/2014 -
" My favorite Texan writer. Jim Thompson understood a world of con-artists and petty theives, and the complicated lives they led. "
— Scott, 2/10/2014 -
" I loved the movie from the 80s and someone recommended the book to me. The book is set in the 60s and seems to fit that atmosphere much better. It's a great twisted story although I wouldn't classify it as suspenseful as the book cover does. "
— Wils, 2/10/2014 -
" The jacket of the copy I read claimed the book to be, "Strong Meat," and I couldn't put it better myself. "
— Pdxjackie, 1/26/2014 -
" Does every American teen go through a phase of reading pulp novels and wanting to grow up to grift? When I actually did grow up, I met, and spent a few days with, a couple of real grifters. They were so totally amoral and devious that they made the characters in this novel seem like lovable Dickensian wastrels. A fun read. "
— Cheri, 1/9/2014 -
" Very good. Dark and twisted with excellent characters and characterizations. The sense of wounded souls abounds in a Thompson novel. "
— Charles, 1/4/2014 -
" Jim Thompson is pretty great. The Killer Inside Me was amazingly dark and potent and The Grifters is full of emotion and darkness that was just as surprising. I never know what to expect and I'm never let down. Great read, check it out. "
— Cesar, 11/25/2013 -
" Probably my favorite Jim Thompson novel. I like the movie a lot, too, though John Cusack is miscast. "
— doug, 11/12/2013 -
" Although I enjoyed this book , I think that this is one of the rare times where I thought the film was better than the book. "
— Nick, 8/27/2013 -
" For some reason, about half way through this book~ it totally lost my interest. No real reason why. I just stopped caring. "
— Andrew, 7/27/2013 -
" Umm, it was good. I was 50 pages into it but I now can't find it. "
— Penny, 7/9/2013 -
" Thank god for my nook for helping me look up words that I didn't know. Reason why I say that b/c this book was written before I was born. I thought it was a fun read. The ending baffled me a little but I remember the part at the very beginning of the book and it all made sense to me "
— Duane, 5/31/2013 -
" I was expecting bleak, but this strikes hard and true: deep into the Death of the American Dream. Formidable. "
— Nate, 5/11/2013 -
" One of those crime novels where there are absolutely no good guys. "
— Joe, 12/17/2011 -
" I liked every Jim Thompson book I ever read. Pop. 1280 was probably the favorite "
— Slim, 12/4/2011 -
" Thompson's hard-boiled, hard-won tale of mothers and sons. Can any writer make a better twist than Thompson? "
— Hank, 11/9/2011
About Jim Thompson
Jim Thompson (1906–1977) was born in Anadarko, Oklahoma. He began writing fiction at a very young age, selling his first story to True Detective when he was only fourteen. He eventually wrote twenty-nine novels, all but three of which were published as paperback originals, and two screenplays, for the Stanley Kubrick films The Killing and Paths of Glory. An outstanding crime writer, he created a world of fiction rife with violence and corruption. In examining the underbelly of human experience and American society in particular, he was both philosophical and experimental. Several of his novels have been filmed by American and French directors, resulting in classic noir such as The Killer inside Me, After Dark My Sweet, and The Grifters.
About Barbara Rosenblat
Barbara Rosenblat, one of the most awarded narrators in the business, was selected by AudioFile magazine as one of the Golden Voices of the Twentieth Century. She has received the prestigious Audie Award multiple times and has earned more than fifty AudioFile Earphones Awards. She has also appeared in film, television, and theater, both in London’s West End and on Broadway.