The Criminal

The Criminal by Jim Thompson is a first person narrative about a crime. The suspect is a teenage boy suspected of raping and killing a neighbors teenage daughter. You get a first person narrative from The suspect, his parrents, and other people who are involved in the case such as a newspaper reporter, copy chief. . . and so on. In the end, everyone else in the book seems more guilty of things, then the boy does in the crime. The book is well written, like every other Jim Thompson novel. The plot is strong, and angles are creative and unique. The characters are well rounded, and explored. The only complaint, is that it is a little short. I would strongly recommend this book!

The Criminal by Jim Thompson is a very short novel. A quick read. But my oh my what a punch it packs. Fourteen year old Josie Eddleman has been raped and murdered. The accused is 15 year old Bob Talbert, Josie's schoolmate and neighbor. Is Bob innocent of the crime? Probably. But then again, maybe he isn't. Thompson never completely resolves this question because this book is not a whodunit. In fact, it is not a conventional novel at all. Thompson has divided The Criminal into 14 short chapters. Different characters involved in the case each serve as first person narrators in one or two of these chapters. There's Bob himself, Bob's father, Bob's mother, the DA, an investigative reporter, the defense attorney, etc. Thompson very skillfully has each narrator give their own perspective on the case while at the same time providing breathtaking insights into his or her own life. This book is a real treat. Page after page contains great dialogue and vivid introspection. Seemingly without effort, Thompson addresses a wide variety of interesting and important themes. The Criminal is a masterful work of fiction. It's the kind of book that reminds us how powerful writing can be.

What a refreshing book, particularly the use of different narrators & the (successful) heavy reliance on dialog to propel the story. I was very concerned Thompson's books would all be alike after I read & loved "The Killer Inside Me" ... & they're not at all ... this is a completely different style from that or from, say, "South of Heaven" or "Now And On Earth." I've read one other book that used this approach, John Burnham Schwartz's much more recent & also excellent "Reservation Road" & it works very well for both writers. Thompson is wonderfully controlled with it, keeping things short & tight. I love how many people assume young Bob Talbert is innocent & railroaded ... in fact, Thompson leaves the question of his innocence or guilt entirely with the reader & it's beautifully ambiguous, especially if the reader is familiar with the sociopathic personality which, without ever saying it, Thompson gives Talbert plenty of room to be. Thompson was ahead of his time understanding criminals & perhaps much of it was intuitive, from what he knew about himself. Whatever his personal weaknesses he was very brave in showing people's inherent capacity for evil, without apologizing for it. It's in Thompson's ability to see the universal capacity for evil that his humanity lies.

I'm a big Jim Thompson fan, and I think this is his very best. A crime occurs, but guilt or innocence quickly loses focus - the suspect becomes a pawn, and each chapter focuses on a different figure (the D.A., the newspaper editor, the suspect's family, etc.) and how they deal with the situation. Each chapter is written in the first person, and has a number of vignettes that, to me, were truly vivid. Thompson's more 'extreme' novels, like The Getaway, The Killer Inside Me, or Pop. 1280, are better-known, but I think the quiet power of this book eclipses them all.

This is a short one but God, it's a masterpiece. Your sympathy and your hate jumps from character to character as the story goes. I find it one of Thompsons more sensitive books in contrast to some of his more hate-filled work. There are some pretty evil persons in this one too though, and you start to question who's to blame for the tragedy in the novel. You don't have to be a crimelover to read and get drawn into this Thompson story.