Rating: 
Summary: Such a long wait for so little
Review: I can't tell you how excited I was to see the new book by Donna Tartt. I continue to rave about Secret History for its detail, intrigue, etc. After reading this one, I am almost embarrassed about my past propaganda...It's almost unbelievable that this is the same author. In the last book, you couldnt wait to turn the page to see what happened to each character. In this book, I honestly couldnt have cared less. I kept on reading expecting to find some hint of that fabulous writing but was disappointed with each chapter/section. I was almost happy to see that other Tartt fans here agree with my assessment...I was wondering if I was losing it. Trust me. Some things aren't worth waiting for....
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Summary: I'm exhausted!
Review: It has never taken me so long to finish a book. The best thing about Ms. Tart's Little Friend is it showed me how musch self discipline I can muster. For a while I thought if her next book comes out a decade from now I will have just finished this one. My expectations parralelled the hype--unfortunately the end product missed the mark.
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Summary: The Little Friend - A Wonderful Story
Review: I was intrigued after hearing Donna Tartt give an interview on public radio. She was very refreshing and definitely thinks for herself. I immediately went out and got both her books. I read The Secret History first and found it very entertaining. Her character and plot development are excellent. I felt like I knew these people and the place even though I have never lived in the US Northeast. When I started reading The Little Friend after just reading the other book, I wasn't sure I would like it. The characters were almost unbelievable at first. The more I read, the more interesting they got. I especially loved the episode where where Harriet and her friend got caught by the group I call [different] and heisted a snake. I live in North Florida and have some relatives who closely resemble Tartt's [diiferent].These types really do exist and in small towns everyone knows to leave them alone. I hate to see the bad reviews but think the reviewers may be harsh because their personal experiences are so remote from the Mississippi story. After completing The Little Friend, I rate it equally as good as The Secret History. It is just a very different story and reminds me of something Mark Twain might have written. It is now one of am favorite novels.
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Summary: Mystery....NOT !!
Review: Having read this book and read the negative reviews, it's rather annoying that some of those readers just don't get it: Donna Tartt writes her novels in the tradition of Faulkner and Harper Lee, even Cormac McCarthy, not Stephen King or John Grisham; novels of complex psychological and emotional commentary, and the uncontrollability of life's events. They are not meant to be clean, straight forward plots with tidy endings. Those kinds of stories evoke the old Miller Lite Beer commercials of "Taste Great, Less Filling". I want "Filling"; character development, metaphoric descriptions that allow one to see, feel, even taste the experience of the characters, empathy, redemption, indifference and guilt.
The premise of loss of innocence is clearly laid out as Harriet embarks on a childish game of Sherlock Holmes, only to end up on a runaway train of tragedy and death, vortexing several hapless, unsuspecting victims with her (some sympathetic and some not). Along the way, Harriet shows a single minded, obsessive vision that she refuses to loses focus on, precisely because she IS innocent and unexperienced with how life and the people in her world are all intertwined and victimized. There's no escaping that reality. THAT is life.
All the character, environmental, social and cultural prose interweave beautifully into an elaborate tapestry that is at once gripping and emotionally exhausting. The book left me feeling spent and satisfied. NOT a waste of time.
I couldn't give the story the maximum score only on the minor point that a 12 year old couldn't possibly be THAT precocious as to handle king cobras and handle and shoot guns in such a calm manner.
Donna - thanks for a great read. I look forward to your next opus.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointment
Review: Donna Tartt's The Secret History is one of my all time favorite books and one of the few books that I have actually read twice. I eagerly anticipated the release of The Little Friend and could not wait to get started. I'm sad to say that this book in no way compares to her debut. The Secret History is both intriguing and eloquent. The Little Friend is neither of these and is a chore to read.
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Summary: A new Faulkner?
Review: I usually don't write reviews, but I almost did not buy this book because of the bad reviews. After reading the book, I have to say that this is not a book one reads at the beach or that you can read lightly. Much like Faulkner, Ms. Tartt creates very deep characters and also like Faulkner makes the environment one of the main characters of her novel. She breathes life into all of her characters and creates a place such that as a reader you become a part of that place. It is an environment, that like a character in a book, you must interact and one that you must react. This book is not one that you can stand blithely on the periphery, but one that you must delve into and actually live. The subject matter is disturbing and often the characters are disturbing, mundane, and infuriating, but that is to make the reader think and live the book. So....reader beware. If you want a novel to make you think and feel then you will like this one. If you are looking for a quick, feel good escape then keep searching.
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Summary: Fabulous descriptions!
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed Tartt's keen descriptions of life in this Mississippi town. The precocious heroine Harriett was an amazing character whose brightness shown through her neglectful upbringing. With each new slight Harriett suffered at the hands of the adult world, her cunning became more charming. I laughed at the right-on descriptions of the neurotic, self-obsessed mother, the grandmother who could have been my own, and the Ratliffs from Hell. The last half of the book revealed a nail-bitting plot describing absolute evil. I thought the ending was perfect: Harriett has dealt with the reality of evil and loss throughout her life. How could such a character deserve a Polyanna ending? I am amazed at other readers who have not liked this book. I'm recommending it to all my book-loving friends!
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Summary: I do not believe it
Review: I love a good mystery novel, and reading the description on the jacket, it seemed like it might be like a mystery novel, so I delved into it. I read The Secret History a long time ago, and remember liking it, but don't remember that much about it. I chomped my way through this one chapter by chapter, even after it became clear it was not going to be a mystery. But after all that effort and time, I expected at least SOME resolution of a FEW of the story's threads, but nothing, NOTHING. I guess her deadline hit and she just had to publish what she had on hand. My anger and dissappointment negated any postive feelings I had about the story and characters developed in it. After reading a lot of other reviews here, at least I don't feel alone. Plus, I can save my husband from a time sink.
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Summary: Sadly, this is a train wreck, not a novel
Review: How could this happen? Did Donna Tartt's agent and editor simply not read the book? Despite a solid beginning, major flaws soon appeared and got worse until finishing the next chapter became a chore. It's a tradegy for this obviously gifted writer-readers are furious at being sucked in by so much hype and given a miserably plotted, bloated, self-indulgent, digressive excuse for a novel. Scenes went no where; character development was sacrified as the author constantly followed one tangeant after another. There was some wonderful writing that got buried under a flood of bad choices that a trusted editor should have caught. Even on a minor scale, the whole drug business seemed like something researched rather than felt; the constant (supposedly experimental?) use of parentheses was extremely irritating. I was a big fan of her first book, this one showed contempt for readers!
Rating:
Summary: Flawed but Worth the Time
Review: Something smells fishy here. The vast majority of reader reviews on this website for this book are extrememly negative and tend to repeat the same comments. The negative reviews are given plenty of positive review comments while those who like the book are criticized. Also, almost all of the negative reviews have been made by people who do not have an Amazon account and can not be e-mailed. I think we are seeing an organized effort to trash this book. Probably some fool on the internet trying to rally rancor for Donna Tartt. Stupid lemmings. I'll admit that this book has its problems, but I did enjoy reading it on a number of levels. For those of you who criticized the book for being overly long, the length is necessary to develop the characters. Tartt has succeeded in creating a number of memorable people including the protagonist Harriet Dufrenses, her family of eccentric aunts and the antagonist Ratliff family. Some of the character devlopment might not have been necessary for the plot, but it made me more interested in the plot because I knew more about the people involved in it. My only complaint is that she didn't do enough on some characters to make them more likeable. For example Harriet's sister Allison could have been an important player in this story, but she was no more than a caricature. As for the plot, the story which looks back on the murder of a young child (Harriet's brother) is a gripping one, once it gets started about 100 pages into the book. Essentially the plot is a young child's reckless search for her brother's murderer. Along the way, Tartt makes a number of sound observations regarding the South. Unlike the misinformed ranting of one other reviewer, Tartt is very critical of the region's racist past. In this book, white trash racists are ridiculed for what they are. While the ending can be rather unsatisfying, unfortunately so is life when it comes to trying to understand the impacts of violent crime. As a whole, I enjoyed this book on many levels and especially for portraying how the victimization that takes place because of a violent crime can cascade for generations. In a similar vein I would recommend Joyce Carol Oates' We Were the Mullvaney's. Of course, Oates is often criticized for being too wordy and for stretching ouit plots just like Donna Tartt is. In summary, if your idea of good reading is USA Today or Cliff's Notes and you are easily swayed by organized internet paranoia, stay away from this book. On the other hand, if you can think for yourself and enjoy complex writing with a very tense plot that takes awhile to develop, buy this book.
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