Rating: 
Summary: All style, little substance
Review: I was sorely disappointed by this much-hyped debut. Tartt has a strong narrator's voice, but no talent for developing her characters. The book sags in the midsection, and attempts at satire seem forced and out of left field. After I finished it I could not really say I knew any of the characters, nor did I care much about them. But hey, they are all young, privileged, and attractive -- very much like the authoress herself. When a writer is this much of a cash cow, the word is usually good. But I'm afraid the book is not.
Rating: 
Summary: Ravel's Bolero of Suspense Novels
Review: We all remember what it was like to be an adolescent (actually, some of us aren't that far away from it, mentally). This book does an incredible job of re-creating that ambience, the torment, the self-doubt, the desire to belong at all costs, the secrets, the alienation. What is disconcerting about it is how artfully Donna Tartt executes that re-creation, so that although the characters are extreme, we well recognize and understand them. But then we come to realize that there is a big difference between their youth and ours: this tightly bound group of intellectual, oddball college students ends up committing a murder. The scene is a small liberal arts college in New England, where Richard Papen goes to begin his escape from his dull past. His origins are in a small town in California, where his father pumps gas and his mother works at home. Richard's years there were meaningless, drab. He quickly re-invents himself, and his glamorous new history -- "swimming pools, orange groves, and dissolute, charming show-biz parents" -- soon eclipses the true one. Richard hears about a course of Greek studies, extremely difficult to be admitted to, and finds himself compelled to join. The other selected -- or elect -- students, whom he watches from afar, are the subject of rumors and fascination on campus. Soon Richard and the others are locked into a sick inter-dependency, with each other and with their enigmatic and potent professor. The Secret History is not a 90 mile-an-hour suspense tale. It is more like a Ravel's Bolero of suspense novels, in that the tension builds slowly and ominously. And the suspense comes not so much from finding out what happened, but from finding out what this "secret history" is doing to Richard and the others who share it. For example, Richard awakens in an infirmary after being felled by pneumonia. He says: "I sat very still, trying not to think. It seemed as if I was waiting for something, I wasn't sure what, something that would lift the tension and make me feel better, though I could imagine no possible event, in past, present, or future, that would have either effect. It seemed as if an eternity had passed. Suddenly, I was struck by a horrible thought: Is this what it's like? Is this the way it's going to be from now on? I looked at the clock. Scarcely a minute had gone by." The excruciating presence of guilt, and the conflicting feelings of loyalty, love, hatred, and envy, have starring roles in the story. Inevitability (and other themes tied in from classical literature) also play. The book will make you squirm, but I recommend it highly. Call this my invitation to a murder.
Rating:
Summary: Great beginning, great story, weak ending.
Review: This book begins like a question already anwsered, which could be a very bad idea. Yet the reader's interest is held by the narrator's rationalization and explanation for why he and this intellectual group of new friends kill one of their own. A literary risk that is truely interesting. However, the story ends about 10 pages before the book ends. The wrap up of what happens the to the characters, even some insignificant characters, after graduation is unnecessary and boring. Nonetheless, The Secret History is still worth the 500 page read.
Rating: 
Summary: A "Secret History" of the world itself
Review: The Secret History explores a heroic effort by five students to recreate, at their small ivy-twined New Hampshire college, a world from which the gods have fled. All five are known eccentrics, and all have their reasons for despising the world they live in. Charmed by a brilliant teacher, drunk with Homer and the ancient legends, they attempt to experience in themselves an earth-old ecstasy. Short-cutting devices like drugs and alcohol only get them high. The Real Thing eludes them until one vital element clicks into place: in order to invoke the gods, it is necessary to believe in them. This simple expedient allows them to finally cast off the moorings of their American middle-class upbringing and plunge into a night of total self-abandonment. They come to, just before dawn, with blood on their hands and a mangled corpse at their feet. At the heart of all religion is a longing for the loss of self and complete surrender to the world of spirit. Henry, the acknowledged leader of the group, explains the appeal and the cost: "I wonder if you understand what sort of state we were in. . . really, truly, out of our minds. And it may be a superhuman effort to lose oneself so completely, but that's nothing compared to the effort of getting oneself back again." Though successful in their quest, they have flung themselves, not into Dionysian revelry, but Faustian tragedy, which works out a suitably inexorable fate for each of them.
For it's impossible to return to the misty mythical morning of time and experience; we know too much. There is no going back through centuries of accumulated blood-guilt to recover a lost innocence. The "essential rottenness of the world" that narrator Richard Papen discovers by novel's end is no illusion, no trendy collegiate attitude; he's experienced it first-hand. Not a cheerful story, and marred by the rambling character of the second half. But gripping, almost literally--the deep scratches left in my mind after reading it were scored by a hard edge of truth..
Rating:
Summary: Still waiting for Tartt's next "secret"!
Review: If you haven't guessed already, all these people are raving for a reason, including myself. I can't believe that this book has been published for so long! I was sixteen when I first read this and now at nineteen, I still read it over and over. It is a must for anyone who enjoys and appreciates a well-woven tale of murder, friendship and the Classics. Because of this book, I enrolled in Liberal Arts and took courses in the Classics. Like everyone else, I am also wondering where our favorite novelist is and what her next project is. To all those who enjoyed this book, and even those who didn't, share your copy with others and hope that some cheezy network does not make this into a TV movie!
Rating:
Summary: Ok, its good but...
Review: Yes its a good book, but if you really want something to change your life, why not try a classics degree in a New England college? Worked for Donna Tartt, didn't it? Furthermore, I feel this book is really a homage to Scott Fitzgerald, to my mind the godfather of preppy American decadence.
If you must read A Secret History (and you must), read The Great Gatsby first to compare. Then maybe you'll know how to recognise a book that really deserves 10 out of 10.
Rating:
Summary: An absorbing page-turner, rich with emotion and intellect.
Review: Intelligent and captivating, The Secret History drew me in from the first paragraph. On the surface it is a mystery about a super-intellectual group of classics students who practice ancient Dionysian rituals to find themselves involved in the murder of one of their group. Initially, one reads just to find out what happened and why. But after a few chapters of exceptionally written prose, we find that Tartt has accomplished much more on several levels. She draws parallels with classic literature, exploring the themes of physical, intellectual and moral decadence, friendship, loyalty and conscience. This is not an action book; many of the important events have already taken place. The suspense builds in the revelation of the complex relationships between Tartt's oddly charismatic characters. Like a psychological thriller the story reaches its climax as the facade of a picturesque college town is torn away, unveiling hidden loyalties and shadowy motives.
Rating:
Summary: The closest thing to a perfect book I've read in a long time
Review: This book is simply mindblowing. The phrase "it will chnage your life" is often over used, but it fits this book perfectly. This is not to say that you'l drop your life and head to New England to study Greek, but you'll look at the world differently as you read the book. Think of the money you spend on it as an investment. I read it at least once a year and pass it on to my friends. Read it on a cloudy winter day and you can see yourself shivering in a warehouse with Richard. A brisk fall day and the leaves literally crackle under your feet. After I read the book I found myself identifying my friends as Bunnies, Henries, Richards, Francises, Charleses, and Camillas. If you finish this book and don't drop your jaw in amazement you've done something wrong.
Rating:
Summary: I bought it when it was first published.....
Review: and I've re-read it numerous times since then. Although I cannot envision this ever happening in real life, I was mesmerized by the imagery and the literary sense of Tartt's prose. No doubt I will read it again and again someday. I must say, I would have not studied Ancient Greek in college if this novel had not compelled me to do so. My studies have almost mirrored the lectures by wonderful Julian and his students. But, Camilla, if not Richard, how about me? RLuck10314
Rating:
Summary: It would have been worth it if it were half as long.
Review: I didn't find most of the characters believable. They seemed more like charicatures. I was disappointed that a woman author couldn't come up with better women characters. The most important female character, Camilla, seemed pretty one-dimensional -- a token attractive female for the males to compete over, and a plot device to help explain how Richard Papen gets caught up in a murder conspiracy. She didn't seem like a real person. Some of the minor women characters, like Judy Poovey, seemed almost misoygynistic. Henry the weird super-genius didn't seem like an earthling. I didn't end up caring about any of them, nor minding that Bunny got killed. The murder that did bother me was that of the Vermont farmer, whom not only the characters but the author seemed to accord no humanity whatsoever. Still, there were many patches of good writing and well-done details that made the book, in a fragmentary way, a string of small pleasures. I had read this just after reading Corelli's Mandolin, which is so clearly a vastly superior novel, perhaps A Secret History paled in comparison.
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