Reviews tagging 'Murder'

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

113 reviews

babbieabbi's review

challenging emotional reflective sad slow-paced

• 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

3.0

I wanted to rate this book higher, because I really loved the first half of it. The prose was beautiful throughout the book. I enjoyed the plot and the characters were great. But I can’t rate this book much higher because it also had some drawbacks. The first was the length. It was way longer than needed, and most things were drawn out much longer than necessary, especially in the last half of the book. And while I found the book poetic and meaningful, the ending felt a little forced, a little too insightful (for lack of a better word) to match the rest of the book or to let me draw my own conclusions about what was meaningful. Overall I liked it, but I don’t think I would read it again

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Suicidal thoughts, Murder, and Vomit

Minor: Racism

arramachandran's review

challenging dark reflective tense slow-paced

• 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

3.5

3.5, the last 20 pages of this book basically saved it for me. However, I think there is something to be said, or rather many things to be said about the portrayal of POC in this book. Every single non-white character is in a service position (doormen, cooks, cleaners, drivers, and social workers), and Tartt builds the characters off of stereotypical fantasies, specifically the deeply offensive “Sikh taxi driver” caricature that made me angry when I read it. Even Boris, Gyuri, and all the other Eastern European characters fulfill every vodka-soaked stereotype of that region. 

Side note: why did she make Boris say the n-word multiple times? They were throwaway phrases in parentheses that added nothing to the story, and it made my jaw drop when I read it. It really seems like she wrote it in because she wanted to, and I’d like to meet the editor that let that pass through.

Anyways, although Tartt’s prose is beautiful and quite profound as always, remembering the shameful writing of POC characters brought down my experience of reading the book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Grief, Alcohol, Death of parent, and Drug use

Moderate: Murder, Suicide attempt, Violence, Death, and Racial slurs

kou_'s review

challenging dark reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Drug abuse, Addiction, and Death of parent

Moderate: Blood, Suicide attempt, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, and Vomit

ewwniamh's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

it took me almost a year to finish this book and although i have some problems with it, i do really have a strong attachment to it and it's characters. 

whether that be because of how long it took me to read it or because i actually enjoyed it as much as the secret history, I'm not sure but that last chapter was absolutely incredible so donna tart has got me in a chokehold again for a second time I guess

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gun violence, Blood, Mental illness, Injury/Injury detail, Alcoholism, Alcohol, Death, Addiction, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Violence, Drug use, Domestic abuse, Murder, Grief, and Drug abuse

Moderate: Suicidal thoughts, Cursing, Racial slurs, Sexual content, Racism, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Vomit, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Medical content and Medical trauma

nils_0's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious relaxing sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicidal thoughts, Blood, Death, Death of parent, Drug use, Animal cruelty, Drug abuse, Murder, Addiction, Alcohol, Cursing, Violence, Alcoholism, Grief, Gun violence, Toxic relationship, Car accident, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Panic attacks/disorders and Vomit

natalieweinberg's review

challenging dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug abuse, Mental illness, Addiction, Alcohol, Drug use, Death, and Death of parent

Moderate: Murder, Violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Vomit, and Gore

Minor: Racial slurs

booksandboba's review against another edition

dark reflective slow-paced

• 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

I can’t give a star/numerical rating to this book because I really don’t know how to describe my feelings.

When I first read it, I loved it, loved the writing style and character development (it was my first or one of my first encounters with writing like this), really related to descriptions of anxiety and depression, considered it my favorite book. Read it a second time and started forming doubts, particularly with noticing issues of classism and racism. Read it a third time, this time annotating heavily for themes present throughout the book (question of fate vs free will, good vs bad and moral responsibility, depression and grief vs hope, art and its beauty and importance, friendship and love, impermanence vs permanence, time, life and death) and enjoyed doing that, but in doing so realized that the book really could have been edited better. I found the ending to be sloppy and not satisfying. And the way that blatant racism is used in the book (equating East Asian and especially Chinese culture and objects with cheapness) is just appalling.

And apparently it took 10 years or more to write this book, which either means that those choices were deliberate and well-thought out, choosing to only have people of color represented in minor roles mostly as working class serving the white upper class, choosing to use racist notions to make character points, or she somehow in all that time failed to consider these choices — why she might be making them, what they mean, what sort of impact they would have — despite the clear time and attention to detail given to making this book. 

Maybe you can claim that Theo, as a character, is racist, and that it just adds to the long list of character flaws and why we can’t trust him as a reliable narrator etc., but we already have so many examples so why would this be necessary? The racism does not directly connect to a point that needs to made either for plot or theme as far as I can see, and even if Theo as a character is just racist, that still doesn’t explain why the only people of color we encounter are in working class positions, save maybe the two social workers. (And he can’t even remember the Korean woman’s name, and just has to mention that her breath smells like garlic?)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Alcoholism, Death, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Vomit, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Suicide attempt, Addiction, Blood, Death of parent, Mental illness, Murder, Cursing, Drug abuse, Drug use, and Gun violence

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Car accident, Classism, Infidelity, Panic attacks/disorders, and Homophobia

Minor: Pregnancy

jg34's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious slow-paced

• 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? It's complicated

4.75

I think I may have missed some of the deeper points by listening on audio I would like to reread a physical copy. Such an interesting and layered story

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Drug abuse, Drug use, and Death of parent

Moderate: Alcoholism, Suicide attempt, Vomit, Addiction, and Violence

Minor: Abandonment

marianneiriss's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Should you read The Goldfinch? Yes, but also no:

If you’ve read and enjoyed other long, slow, and at times frustrating books (for example, Crime and Punishment!), you like to read books with entirely unlikeable characters and unreliable narrators, and you don’t mind forays into odd, illogical, trains of thought and extremely long sentences - yes, definitely read The Goldfinch! 

If you’ve read and enjoyed The Secret History, and you are hoping for something in the same vein of content/themes from The Goldfinch - I probably wouldn’t recommend it to you, because it’s honestly nothing like TSH, and I think you might be disappointed if you go into expecting it to be similar!

Personally, I thought that although it’s not an easy read, it was worth it. I’ve not been able to stop thinking about The Goldfinch since I finished last month. 

I loved the lyrical writing - Donna Tartt has beautiful prose. And she captures this feeling of a kind of resigned despair so well, it pervades the entire book. I actually had to take a bit of a break from reading it at one point just to read something a bit less unhappy (I wouldn’t class this as ‘a sad book’ necessarily, but it is an unhappy book, at times desperately so). I’ve included some content warnings at the end of this review, and I would recommend looking into them before you decide to commit to reading The Goldfinch, as it does deal with heavy subject matter. 

All this being said, I did think that it is a fantastic book overall, and if you’re currently battling through it I would recommend sticking with it, as you’ll be glad by the end that you did. Despite how frustrating it feels at times - I certainly felt like yelling at Theo “please, just don’t do that, just don’t” at multiple points! - it is well worth persevering with it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Cursing, Mental illness, Suicidal thoughts, Panic attacks/disorders, Grief, Suicide, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Death, Drug use, Death of parent, Drug abuse, and Suicide attempt

Moderate: Blood, Gun violence, Toxic friendship, Murder, Abandonment, and Infidelity

eher1305's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Drug abuse, Drug use, Domestic abuse, Suicide attempt, Toxic friendship, Violence, Vomit, Alcohol, Emotional abuse, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, Mass/school shootings, Panic attacks/disorders, and Physical abuse