Reviews tagging 'Body horror'

Gizli Tarih by Donna Tartt

73 reviews

jennyooh_'s review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Death, and Murder

Minor: Addiction, Body horror, Drug use, Gun violence, Suicide, and Toxic friendship

abbeerambles's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

• 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

5.0

Very good book. I am now concerned for the people who romanticize these characters or want to live this kind of "elite" academia life. The entire point of the book, the WHOLE POINT is to warn readers off of wanting to be like them. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Gun violence, Homophobia, Mental illness, Murder, and Suicide

Moderate: Antisemitism, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Classism, Drug use, Incest, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Racism, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, and Racial slurs

Minor: Medical content, Sexism, Death of parent, Car accident, and Animal cruelty

The N-slur is used, specifically directed toward a middle eastern man. There are many generally racist statements made throughout the book, toward many groups of people. Particularly several antisemitic comments. The F-slur is used several times at the beginning of the book. The characters, including the POV character, use drugs and alcohol gratuitously throughout the book.

The twins are incestuous. It's implied that the male twin Charles is abusive toward the female twin Camilla.

bvrealis's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

4.0

«It's a very Greek idea, and a very profound one. Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it. And what could be more terrifying and beautiful, to souls like the Greeks or our own, than to lose control completely? To throw off the chains of being for an instant, to shatter the accident of our mortal selves? Euripides speaks of the Maenads: head thrown I back, throat to the stars, "more like deer than human being." To be absolutely free! One is quite capable, of course, of working out these destructive passions in more vulgar and less efficient ways. But how glorious to release them in a single burst! To sing, to scream, to dance barefoot in the woods in the dead of night, with no more awareness of mortality than an animal! These are powerful mysteries. The bellowing of bulls. Springs of honey bubbling from the ground. If we are strong enough in our souls we can rip away the veil and look that naked, terrible beauty right in the face; let God consume us, devour us, unstring our bones. Then spit us out reborn.»

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Alcohol, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Gore, Gun violence, and Murder

tiemzahra's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.0

Richard Papen was one of the six students under the supervision of a classics professor. These six misfits was influenced by this professor and adopted a new way of thinking but accidentally go beyond the boundaries of normal morality. 

 

 My opinions regarding this book are highly polarised. I could give reasons why I like this book and at the same time hate it intensely. In the end, this is an intriguing read from the very start, and I opted for the former. 

 

Why I like this book: thrilling, page turner 

 

Why I could hate this book: no one I could say is my favourite, privileged college kids doing doing privileged things, extremities of everyone’s life choices, everyone is pretentious, (although I think it’s one of the main characteristics of dark academia, and Richard turned out to be fair and non-condescending towards others outside of his group), everything about Bunny 

 

This book does not follow whodunit narrative, plot-driven, quite a slow read (I don’t mind this at the slightest), allusions to many classics (these people are elitists). However, they had their fatal flaws that made them unfitting in a normal society. I should hate them, but in the end, they made me so sad (except for Bunny, I have little sympathy over his death). That distinct melancholic feeling I get after finishing this book was so intense, that I believe The Secret History has impacted me despite the many reasons I have to hate it. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Death, Mental illness, Murder, Suicide, Toxic friendship, Addiction, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Blood, and Body horror

Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Suicide attempt, Abandonment, Drug abuse, Drug use, Homophobia, and Incest

Minor: Sexism, Animal death, Dysphoria, Misogyny, and Outing

rileaf's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-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: Alcohol, Alcoholism, Cursing, Drug abuse, Drug use, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Violence

Moderate: Incest, Violence, Mental illness, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis

Minor: Body horror, Blood, Homophobia, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, and Sexual content

nadas's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

3.0

I found it really hard to rate this book and my rating will probably change after a while too. I really enjoyed this book and there were many many things I loved about it. But, there were also a lot of things that I disliked and some that even made me uncomfortable.
So first the things I liked: the writing style. I loved the way Donna tart describes things and the atmosphere she set.I also think Richard was a really really good main character and the way the whole book was written like a diary entry (kinda??) after many years of th incidents in the book.
I didnt feel a special attachment to the characters or anything but I loved them still specially Henry (my favourite character troupe honestly I loved him) 
Ok now on the things that I didn't like: the way they're all SO DRUNK ALL THE TIME. Maybe this is just a personal thing but one of my biggest pet peeves in books is characters that are so drunk all the time it makes *me* dizzy. And the fact that almost all the characters in this university are either always drunk or always smoking something just kinda ruined the mood for me. 
Also another thing I didn't like was how there were blocks of text about things that had absolutely nothing to do with the plot. I know it's just to make it look like Richard is kinda drifting away from the topic or is just getting distracted but it got really exhausting after a while I didn't like it. 

also the part about the Palestinian American was SO unnecessary and contributed nothing to the plot??? What was the point of that?? I was so close to dnfing the whole book just for that part if it wasn't resolved well but really if it was removed completely it would not make the slightest difference

Overall I enjoyed it though!! But it's probably not the kind of book I'd reread.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Death, Incest, Murder, and Racial slurs

Moderate: Body horror, Gore, and Suicide attempt

phoebedowling's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective tense medium-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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Alcohol, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Antisemitism, Blood, Body horror, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Gun violence, Grief, Incest, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Mental illness, Murder, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Sexual content, Suicide, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, Stalking, Toxic friendship, and Violence

lou_o_donnell's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

• 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

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcohol, Alcoholism, Animal death, Blood, Body horror, Car accident, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gaslighting, Gun violence, Grief, Gore, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Vomit, and Violence

annaboscher's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror

Moderate: Suicide, Suicide attempt, Homophobia, Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Drug use, Gun violence, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Rape

noahfence's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

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

5.0

this book is just gorgeous. one of the points made very early on in the novel is that ‘death is the mother of beauty, and beauty is terror’ and i think tartt really proves this point in the secret history. even the most horrifying, traumatic events are somehow turned into something glorious (in the terrifying, biblical sense of the word)—and if not glorious, then simultaneously horrifyingly beautiful and extremely poignant.

the tension in the secret history builds tentatively for over 250 pages before sharply tumbling downwards in a rapid deterioration that ends in a way you would never expect—but simultaneously in the only way it could ever end.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide, Death, Grief, Homophobia, Murder, and Sexual assault

Moderate: Drug abuse, Drug use, Incest, Suicide attempt, and Misogyny

Minor: Blood, Panic attacks/disorders, Body horror, Animal cruelty, and Animal death