is
a fictionalized graphic novel account of infamous author Patricia Highsmith caught up in the longing and obsession that would inspire her groundbreaking work of queer fiction, The Price of Salt. A New York Times Book Review 100 Notable Books of the Year A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Named a Book We Loved by NPR New York Times bestselling author Grace Ellis and illustrator Hannah Templer have teamed up to tell Patricia Highsmith's story through her eyes--reimagining the events that inspired her to write
The Price of Salt, the book that would become a foundational piece of queer literature.
Flung Out of Space opens with Pat begrudgingly writing low-brow comics. A drinker, a smoker, and a hater of life, Pat knows she can do better. Her brain churns with images of the great novel she could and should be writing, what will eventually be
Strangers on a Train, which would later be adapted into a classic film by Alfred Hitchcock in 1951.
At the same time, Pat, a lesbian consumed with self-loathing, is in and out of conversion therapy, leaving a trail of sexual conquests and broken hearts in her wake. However, one of those very affairs--and a chance encounter in a department store--give Pat the idea for her soon-to-be beloved tale of homosexual love that was the first of its kind: It gave the lesbian protagonists a happy ending.
This is not just the story behind a classic queer book but also of a queer artist who was deeply flawed. It's a comic about what it was like to write comics in the 1950s, but also about what it means to be a writer at any time in history, struggling to find your voice.
Author Grace Ellis contextualizes Patricia Highsmith as both an unintentional queer icon
and a figure whose problematic views and noted anti-Semitism have cemented her controversial legacy. Highsmith's life imitated her art with results as devastating as the plot twists that brought her fame and fortune.