For Writing The Murder (edited by Dan Coxon & Richard V Hirst) I joined some illustrious colleagues discussing the craft of crime fiction. I began by writing about my meeting with Patricia Highsmith…
‘My encounter with one of crime fiction’s truly legendary names, Patricia Highsmith, was memorable – to say the least. What’s more, it conformed to the image that is most commonly associated with her: that she was a difficult woman, impatient with social niceties, who took no prisoners. I was in my twenties, and it was at an author’s publishing launch in London – though not a launch for one of her own books (she, like me, was a guest). When I spotted an intense-looking woman with sloping shoulders, standing alone in the corner of the room and smoking furiously (as was permissible indoors then), I said to my host, a celebrated editor of crime fiction, ‘Surely that’s Patricia Highsmith?’ When he confirmed with a wry smile that indeed it was, I asked why nobody was talking to her. ‘Go and speak to her, Barry,’ he replied, ‘and you’ll see why!’ I gritted my teeth and walked over – I knew her reputation…
