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Summary: Do come into Donna Tartt's world...
Review: Donna Tartt's skill is her ability to create such whole, complex and alive characters that they can't fade out ot our memory; they go along with us just like friends we haven't met for long...
After reading and re-reading her "Secret History"," The Little Friend" is more slowly paced than her first novel, but more introspective into the characters' study. Every one of them takes a life of their own, we feel, smell, react the way they do, whether they're the heroes or secondary characters. They become acquaintances. We are being plunged into a small Mississippi town setting, where Harriet, a 12 year old girl, sets out one summer to enquire about the death of her brother Robin, found hanging from a tree on Mother's Day ,12 years earlier, and whose murderer has never been identified. She was a few months old at the time. The family has never recovered from this death, and Harriet, as well as her sister Alison, are left much to themselves by a mother who's been living apart from the real world ever since. Harriet is a very bright and receptive little girl, her brain is never at rest, her faculties much higher than her age (maybe too high for her age...) and she devises ways and means to find who killed her brother, with the assistance of Hely, her only friend.
Doing this, she interferes with the life of many people, and the intrigue slowly and inexorably progresses through actions initiated by Harriet, but also (unbeknownst to her) through the reactions - expected or not - of the other characters. For Harriet can't know or understand everything...
It all winds down to a stupefying ending that asks all the right questions... This novel can be read as a thriller, as a "Bildungsroman", or as a psychological novel, but anyway it is a must if you enjoy the unveiling of secrets, souls, atmospheres - which you're not likely to forget...
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Summary: absolutely splendid!
Review: "The snow in the mountains was melting and Bunny had been dead for several weeks before we came to understand the gravity of our situation." Thus it began. One of the most brilliant literary novels of the entire decade. There started The Secret History, and there started the career of the mysterious, enigmatic Donna Tartt. Thanks Heaven for her. After first having read this, if I could have kissed the ground she walked on I just might have done so. The book concerns an elite group of classics students at a New England university, and is told from the point of view of Richard Pappen, a new addition to their number who gradually assimilates into the tightly-knit, insular band. Over time, Richard comes to learn their secrets, eventually coming to the point where he, too, must now share responsibility in a new, monstrous act of murder. So much has been written about this novel, but rarely has anything quite adequately illustrated the joy and breathless wonder which reading this novel engenders. And much of that has to do with what a sublime writer Tartt is. Where most modern literature now shines its light of praise on dearth, sparsity and water-clear prose, Tartt invites us into something different, treating us with rich, sumptuous sentences, so satisfying and beautiful that they inspire no small sense of elation at witnessing how the English language can be used as such a medium for intricacy and erudition. Not once is the prose bloated, though. It's like partaking of an especially fine meal, cooked by the French, with its delicate tints of herbs and spices, but served with the hospitality of the Greeks. The detail in the writing sparkles and glints like sapphires in an ocean, pieces of quartz embedded in a road which winds up to lush, green mountains bathed in dusky winter sunlight. The cumulative effect of the prose is powerful and mesmeric, like staring at the beautiful tempered pattern on the back of a cobra. The plot is entirely gripping, its pace almost perfect, its characters mysterious and charismatic. The experience of it is rather like reading something of Dickensian detail, with the tone and register of something by Bret Easton Ellis, yet which has its roots and themes in Greek literature. There is something distinctly Homeric about it all, and there are more than enough classical references smattered throughout - never gratuitously though, may I make clear! - to have lovers of the period convulsed in delight. The book itself is split into two parts; the first is a brilliant build-up to a murder, suspenseful and slightly dangerous, while the second is a wonderful study in the effects and power of guilt. The isolation of it, though you may share it with others, and the deep echoing pain of it, its potentially ruinous nature. And all the while it manages as well to be a serious - if perhaps skewed in its perhaps limited focus - examination of the morality of contemporary society. The Secret History is a brilliant marriage of the cerebral, the thoughtful, and the refined, gripping thriller. It is that rare thing, a novel of literature that more than holds its own, commercially and through time, against pop-fiction, and certainly surpasses much of it in quality. The secret of The Secret History is definitely not one to keep to yourself! An absolutely perfect performance.
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Summary: You don't have to be (a) Greek...
Review: As a creative writing major, I found this book full of allusions and references to all that is great in classical literature. The writing and story takes the reader in and allows him/her to experience anything the characters encounter.
It's a crazy, Bacchanalian tale that makes you wish you could you experience the out-of-body-and-mind frenzy experienced by the characters.
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Summary: Rubbish book-don't buy it!
Review: I just bought "The secret history" to read on holiday.It must be the worst bookI have EVER read.Sooo disappointing!
Do I care about the characters? NO! Does anything happen in the 630 pages? NO!
Don't waste your money...read a telephone directory instead.
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Summary: Graceful Style, Gripping Characters
Review: The first thing that comes to mind about The Secret History was the style in which Donna Tartt writes, gripping the reader and picking out some of the most minute details of a scene and describing them in a way that put you right there- "The Rain slanted in the lights, which were angled to cast long, dramatic shadows. The effect was fashionable, post- nuclear but ancient, too, like some pumice-strewn courtyard from Pompeii." Tartt really takes the time to describe a scene using details that connect the reader in truly unique ways to the story she is trying to tell. It is a style in which shows the true power books can have. In the first few pages, we are first presented with our main character, a college student named Richard Papen, as he is looking back on a murder he was witness to. He tells his story of how he crossed paths with an intense, unique group of Greek students, who took him under their wing and trusted him with some of their deepest secrets. Each character in the group is extreme in more ways than most would think possible, and Tartt does a great job in creating a smooth-flowing nonstop journey from beginning to end. I recommend giving The Secret History a try. It is unlike many of the books you find on today's best seller lists, in that there is nothing Hollywood about it. There is no need for jaw-dropping twists, and nothing is truly spelled out until you've probably already figured it out yourself. An intelligent, well-written story that will make you think, and want to read over again.
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Summary: A short review
Review: This will be short, but to the point. This book was one of the best I've read in my life. Just as the blurbs describe: chilling, enthralling, and so well written. I tried to skim a little at the beginning but found it impossible to do. What a piece of writing and I can't remember how I came across it or why I ordered it. I'm on to find out what else this talent has written and I hope her subsequent books are as enjoyable.
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Summary: This is a keeper!
Review: I received this book as a BOOKCROSSING.COM release. While the cover makes it look like a romance novel (it's NOT) and the title's totally forgettable this is one of my favorite books of all time. I will be buying a copy for my own library very soon! The author makes you feel as though you've been welcomed into the characters' inner circle. I enjoyed it cover to cover and enjoy thinking what the characters may have done after the story ended.
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Summary: Oh so much,much better , second time around!!!
Review: I read "The Secret History" once, because it had been "suggested" - "you'll love it"; and Yes, I liked it very much. Then, I was required to read it for my Book Club - so, thought I would just "scan" it....but, no I could not ...it was as if I was reading A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT book (which had to be "savoured". (Years ago, when Umberto Eco's "Name of the Rose" was first translated from the Spanish, a very "cerebal" friend who requested me to read it (since he only read "more important writings" i.e., no fiction), but wanted an opinion of it, "scathingly" informed me that it could be read on three different levels - psychologically, philosophically....... or as a plain ordinary who-done-it! So perhaps, I read "The Secret History" first as just that, but this time around, really appreciated the characterization, the writings (and the ever-present foreboding aura of dread.)
Rating:
Summary: a great book
Review: I highly recommend this book. Everyone I've lent it to is a fan!!
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Summary: Definitely not a bildungsroman
Review: I was enthralled with "The Secret History." Beautifully written and intelligent, it's a book that makes you feel more well-read for reading and understanding most of its many classical references. After free-basing on chick-lit for the summer, Ms. Tartt's dense work is welcome.
There are many things to enjoy about this book, that the reviews don't give you an idea of.
1. The tone and characterization throughout the book are remarkably consistent. You feel like you know their next move, and you understand why they do what they do.
2. This is a college book. But before you get turned off by that, realize that Ms. Tartt uses the college setting to create a time-within-time narrative that is skilled and fascinating. She writes of Hampden college as though it were the 1950s, even though small details indicate the modern setting.
3. There are many, many classical references in here, so the more you know, the more interesting you will find it. There is also a fair amount of text in other languages, so Greek, French, and Latin will come in handy, but are not absolutely necessary.
4. The description and setting are masterful. The college and the characters are written out in such detail that you can see and smell them.
5. This is NOT a bildungsroman (a work where you see the characters grow up and evolve, usually into better people, because of their experiences). One of the things that I liked best about this book was the lack of that. These characters are basically the same throughout the book. They don't really learn anything or have any epiphanies about life. They are as stuck in time as their school is. This book is overly long. Some of the passages move from detailed to verbose very quickly. But her characters and setting are flawless. If you have the sense of nostalgia for your college years that this book demands, read this.
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