Reviews tagging 'Cursing'

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

282 reviews

aristarcodisamo's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Drug use, Alcoholism, Death, Murder, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Drug abuse, Incest, Gun violence, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Moderate: Grief, Panic attacks/disorders, Blood, Domestic abuse, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Sexual content, Animal cruelty, Cancer, Homophobia, Misogyny, Cursing, Death of parent, and Eating disorder

carodunn's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

• 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

4.75

very nihilistic in a satisfying way

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Murder, Toxic friendship, Self harm, Suicide attempt, Cursing, Drug abuse, Homophobia, and Death

Moderate: Racial slurs, Gun violence, Incest, Religious bigotry, Antisemitism, Dysphoria, Mental illness, Sexism, Emotional abuse, Islamophobia, Medical trauma, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Sexual violence and Suicidal thoughts

sugar_fox's review against another edition

dark emotional reflective tense medium-paced

• 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

This book, despite taking me a long time to finish reading is a must-read for anyone and everyone. Never in this book was there a moment where I thought it was dull. Even the everyday occurrences in this school was made intriguing beyond belief, hell, I’d go as to say I enjoyed every moment of this book. Never did I hate it, something rare for me. The only thing, if you hate being made to feel stupid, don’t read this book. The amount of literary references, and the many others I probably missed was crazy.  

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Content Warnings

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

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• 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

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Content Warnings

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

maelikesbooks's review against another edition

dark mysterious reflective 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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Bullying, Cursing, Incest, Addiction, Alcoholism, Antisemitism, Violence, Alcohol, Classism, Drug use, Gun violence, Murder, Suicide, Toxic friendship, Drug abuse, Death, and Homophobia

sgtbuckaroo's review against another edition

dark mysterious 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? No

4.0

I really did enjoy reading this book, the characters and the story. However, enjoying the characters does not mean liking them as people. Because they are most definitely not meant to be likeable people. Enjoyable? Yes. Likeable? No.

They are all, in some way or another and some more than others, people who you wouldn’t want to be around in real life. Each character has at least one undesirable trait, and they are all morally gray if not explicitly bad people. However, I still found them enjoyable, which I believe is made possible by the fact that they are clearly not meant to be likeable as human beings.

I also found it very interesting to read about and analyze Richard’s perspective of everyone else, and compare it to my understanding of them (although using only Richards observations).

The writing was good, as one would expect from a writer such as Donna Tartt, although a little difficult at some points which I believe is because  I am not a native English speaker. However, even though some parts were more difficult than others, they were never to the extent of being too much or unintelligible. 

I’ve put off reading this book for quite some time, but I’m very glad I got to reading it. It’s a great story, and a very interesting one.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Violence, Mental illness, Suicide, Murder, Alcohol, Toxic friendship, Addiction, Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Domestic abuse, and Alcoholism

Moderate: Toxic relationship, Cursing, Death, and Gun violence

Minor: Animal death, Bullying, Incest, Animal cruelty, Homophobia, Grief, Suicide attempt, and Panic attacks/disorders

rebekkamafia's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Alcoholism, Classism, Drug use, and Alcohol

Moderate: Incest, Addiction, Blood, Homophobia, Cursing, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Vomit, Murder, Suicide, Gun violence, Medical content, Physical abuse, and Toxic friendship

Minor: Racism, Antisemitism, Misogyny, Racial slurs, Sexism, Rape, Suicide attempt, Eating disorder, Fatphobia, and Suicidal thoughts

jade_0222's review against another edition

dark emotional tense 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? It's complicated

3.75

I had intended to read this book in October. I was so excited to start reading it and get immersed in its dark academic story. There were points in the story that I took my time to read, which is why I ended up finishing it in November. However, there were parts of it that just seemed so jarring, plotwise and logically speaking, that I found myself wanting to give up reading the book. I have mixed emotions about The Secret History. I think I may have overhyped the book in my head, only to be left unsatisfied. Don't get me wrong, the plot is very interesting and the characters, though not entirely likable, are fairly well-fleshed out. I just wasn't a fan of the very quick wrap-up ending, I felt like the process of Bunny's death seemed borderline impossible to be done without getting caught, <SPOILER> They don't really get caught, and essentially got away with murder...twice, and I had a lot of questions that felt unanswered, and the epilogue left much to be desired.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Drug use, Murder, Addiction, and Death

Moderate: Cursing

idiealittle's review against another edition

dark 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? It's complicated

0.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Incest, Classism, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Alcohol, Bullying, Cursing, Drug abuse, and Emotional abuse

mmeschi's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced

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

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Self harm, Alcohol, Suicide, Suicide attempt, Classism, Addiction, and Alcoholism

Moderate: Gore and Cursing

Minor: Incest