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sugar_fox's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Mental illness, Toxic friendship, Murder, Addiction, Alcoholism, Drug use, and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Cursing, Sexism, Violence, Gaslighting, Grief, Homophobia, Infidelity, Racial slurs, Suicidal thoughts, Incest, Death, Drug abuse, and Emotional abuse
Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Misogyny, Suicide attempt, Car accident, and Outing
faithstuff's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Mental illness, Physical abuse, Suicide, Toxic friendship, Panic attacks/disorders, Chronic illness, Toxic relationship, Alcohol, Blood, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Dysphoria, Suicide attempt, Addiction, Classism, Drug abuse, Suicidal thoughts, Alcoholism, Death, Incest, Violence, Gore, Grief, and Medical content
biobeetle's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Death, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Incest, Violence, and Mental illness
Minor: Sexual content
justaddwater's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Grief, Gun violence, Homophobia, Incest, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual violence, Addiction, Alcohol, Classism, Gore, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, Violence, Alcoholism, Injury/Injury detail, Toxic friendship, Religious bigotry, and Toxic relationship
Minor: Sexual harassment, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Blood, Body horror, Sexual content, and Torture
theliteraryel's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it.
First and foremost, Donna Tartt's writing style is a beautiful. Her elegant and evocative tone draws you into a world where the lines between right and wrong are often blurred. The morally ambiguous characters are beautifully crafted, and their complex development keeps you questioning yours throughout the novel. One page you despise them and the next, you feel for them, heartbroken over their inner turmoil. There may be spoilers from here onwards, was hard to separate them.
Francis, a sensitive soul, is perhaps the most genuine among the group. He proves on many occasion he cares deeply about everyone in the group. He keeps going until the unbearable guilt almost consumes him. His letter to Richard in the epilogue, revealing his suicidal plan, broke my heart.
"Forgive me, for all the things I did but mostly for the ones that I did not."
While I was never so relieved he survived, it was so sad to see him succumbed his grandfathers pressure and married a woman he didn’t love and had to walk away from the man he loved. Despite being far from the ideal, I think, I am still glad that he survived.
Richard is the narrator. We read everything through his memories. It is so open to manipulate, as he learned from the best, how much did he manipulate us, readers? Despite all the paranoia, it is impossible not to empathize with his desperation for belonging to a group, a family, to fit in his new world.
I would’ve been unhappy anywhere.He also didn’t know how to ask for things, for help or for attention. It was heartbreaking when he was shot and waited them to realize and nobody did.
He brought most on himself. He knew it was wrong to kill Bunny, he literally had no reason to because he wasn’t involved with neither Bacchanal nor killing the farmer during, yet he went along with it because he was loyal to the fault, he adopted their crimes, was manipulated into terrible things, which ended breaking him beyond repair. He realized Henry’s ulterior motives too late. His love for Camilla was something I also not something I quite understood as we almost never saw them together, but at the end of everything, after all those years, they way he begged was one of the saddest moments in the book. He is one of the most loneliest characters I have ever read, he ends up with the ghost of Henry and even that leaves him in the end.
Does such a thing as “the fatal flaw,” that showy dark crack running down the middle of a life, exist outside literature? I used to think it didn’t. Now I think it does. And I think that mine is this: a morbid longing for the picturesque at all costs.
Henry probably the most complex character of all, charismatic, intelligent, wealthy, natural leader and yet a narcissistic manipulator who is so subtle and artful that it is almost impossible to notice, to say no. Despite knowing all his flaws, probably seeing through him before Richard does, it is really hard not to be fascinated by him. He had twisted relationships with everyone. I never quite understood why he gave in to Bunny before the Bacchanal, he seemed to dislike him and weirdly pitying him for his shitty family but it still doesn’t explain everything he let Bunny. And it was carnal after the murder of the farmer, as if almost he let Bunny to an insufferable point to justify killing him. It was same for Bunny’s family afterwards, obviously it is guilt and all, but still it is hard to understand why he took that much of weird attitude from Corcorans. There is so much to anaylize and unload just about Henry. The way he is gone, he remains enigmatic and making you question his motives till the very end.
Camilla and Charles were package deal most times. While Camilla was more silent and reserved, Charles was outgoing and fun. We never truly saw her or understood her motives. The only moment Camilla was honest and I appreciated her was at the very end, when she finally admitted her love for Henry and turned Richard down. Charles’s transformation from timid, charming and outgoing young man to dark, abusive and paranoid broken boy was an impressive reverse character development. Their complex and abusive relationship went beyond imagination all the way till incest. This turned to a breaking point for all, Henry killing himself and Charles being mentally further broken. Despite turning into a horrible person, I was sad for Charles in the end, from all that glory to living in a hole. The guilt and paranoia ate him alive. He deserved that? Maybe, probably, definitely. But still hard to witness a human breaking down to that point even if they brought it on themselves.
“And if beauty is terror,” said Julian, “then what is desire? We think we have many desires, but in fact we have only one. What is it?”
“To live,” said Camilla.
“To live forever,” said Bunny, chin cupped in palm.
Bunny was hard to like from the start, cruel, selfish, homophobic, liar, abuser and so on. The way he spoke was so pretentious and condescending all the time made his dialogues were hard to believe. He became unbearable with constant blackmailing, cruel remarks and demands. It is easy to say that he brought his own downfall, he deserved to be killed. But did he really? The biggest moral quest of all characters in the book. They could justify it in many ways but did they actually have right to kill him? Absolutely not. I disliked Bunny throughout the book, still, when he got pushed off the cliff, something tugged at my chest. It was hard to bear all that dragged and overdone funeral for him. In the light of his letter to Julian, towards the end I found myself missing him and feeling sad for his end. Manipulation at its finest, huh?
Julian was the most influential figure despite his absence. I wished we had more of his lectures. His passion and teaching style were ultimately responsible for his students’ obsessive actions? Maybe. Was he directly responsible? Of course, not. I expected he acted differently in the end, somehow mend his destructive influence on them in some ways. Instead, he immediately ran away. Maybe he was afraid for his own life, or being dragged into the murders in case they were revealed or maybe, he was simply horrified of what he had influenced. We will never know, I guess.
There are so many things to talk about this book, yet I’m stunned since I read it. I have to admit it was not an easy read, not meant to be, probably. While the book's non-linear timeline adds to its allure, some plot points feel dragged and eventually unresolved. I was so paranoid at some points I was suspicious with every single one of them. Probably how Bunny and Charles felt. I admired them, I hated them, I felt for them, I felt uneasy, I felt all the feelings. The meticulous world building and description of atmosphere sucked you in, immediately. It was almost as if feeling among them listening them talking from the corner of a room or back in the class.
The whole book is questioning beauty and morality. This exploration of beauty leads to the characters decent into guilt and destruction one by one. Donna Tartt successfully achieves to question your morals along with the rollercoaster of feelings. A true masterpiece and something to come back to, indeed.
Love doesn’t conquer everything. And whoever thinks it does is a fool.
PS: The amount of alcohol and cigarettes consumed in the book was highly disturbing. I could feel my lungs and liver give up reading it.
Graphic: Suicide attempt, Murder, Alcohol, Suicide, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Animal death, Addiction, Grief, and Incest
Minor: Panic attacks/disorders and Drug use
madilikestoread's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
Graphic: Gaslighting, Incest, and Murder
Moderate: Addiction, Suicide, and Alcohol
Minor: Animal death
pbeeandj's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
Graphic: Incest, Drug use, Suicide attempt, Murder, Classism, Drug abuse, Alcoholism, Gun violence, Racial slurs, Suicide, Islamophobia, Homophobia, and Grief
Moderate: Gaslighting, Domestic abuse, Chronic illness, Injury/Injury detail, Toxic relationship, and Panic attacks/disorders
Minor: Antisemitism, Vomit, Rape, Animal cruelty, Misogyny, and Sexism
colittle's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
Graphic: Alcohol, Toxic friendship, Classism, Gaslighting, Murder, Alcoholism, Death, Drug use, Mental illness, and Suicide
Moderate: Addiction, Blood, Cursing, Domestic abuse, Forced institutionalization, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Body shaming, Homophobia, Misogyny, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Sexism, Islamophobia, Medical content, Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, Racial slurs, Grief, Gun violence, Infidelity, Outing, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, and Incest
jaynovara's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Murder, Suicide, Alcoholism, and Toxic friendship
Moderate: Bullying, Gaslighting, Gun violence, Animal cruelty, Death, and Blood
Minor: Self harm, Suicide attempt, Homophobia, Drug use, Incest, and Medical trauma
just_a_random_dead_thing's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Graphic: Grief, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Murder, Toxic friendship, Incest, Gaslighting, Drug abuse, Drug use, Death, and Addiction
Moderate: Sexism, Gun violence, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Religious bigotry, Homophobia, Antisemitism, Hate crime, Classism, Animal death, Sexual assault, Cursing, and Animal cruelty
Minor: Car accident, Forced institutionalization, Death of parent, and Domestic abuse