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3.96 AVERAGE
3.96 AVERAGE
emotional
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
easily my favorite book ever, it rewrote my view on the world
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I'm really glad I read this book, but I'm not sure if I liked it. I certainly didn't love it. The writing style is excellent, but the story telling and pacing left some to be desired. This book is kinda all over the place.
I really enjoyed the first section in New York. It left me with extremely high expectations for the rest of the book, but I feel the story never reached its potential. The whole section in Vegas spiraled out of control into a mess of delinquency and stupidity. I get that Boris needed to be introduced as a character, but it really killed the pace. I also disliked much of the Amsterdam scenes. Theo was already part of a totally unrealistic scenario. Even if it would be a stretch, I would have rather read about him being apart of the Germany events rather than sitting around pointlessly in his Amsterdam hotel.
I did love the characters of this book. I came to care about what happened to them even if I didn't really like them. That made the end of the novel pretty awful for me. The main plot resolves, but then we just drift out of everyone's lives. What happens between theo and kitsey or theo and pippa? Boris seems destined to die young, but does he? What about Hobart? Mrs Barbour? Heck, even what happens with Lucius reeve and havistock? An epilogue would have been nice...
In summary, this is a good book but has, to my tastes, some shortcomings. I wish it could have lived up to its strong start, but still definitely worth the considerable time it took to read it.
I really enjoyed the first section in New York. It left me with extremely high expectations for the rest of the book, but I feel the story never reached its potential. The whole section in Vegas spiraled out of control into a mess of delinquency and stupidity. I get that Boris needed to be introduced as a character, but it really killed the pace. I also disliked much of the Amsterdam scenes. Theo was already part of a totally unrealistic scenario. Even if it would be a stretch, I would have rather read about him being apart of the Germany events rather than sitting around pointlessly in his Amsterdam hotel.
I did love the characters of this book. I came to care about what happened to them even if I didn't really like them. That made the end of the novel pretty awful for me. The main plot resolves, but then we just drift out of everyone's lives. What happens between theo and kitsey or theo and pippa? Boris seems destined to die young, but does he? What about Hobart? Mrs Barbour? Heck, even what happens with Lucius reeve and havistock? An epilogue would have been nice...
In summary, this is a good book but has, to my tastes, some shortcomings. I wish it could have lived up to its strong start, but still definitely worth the considerable time it took to read it.
An incredibly moving, wrenching, rending novel. Sprawling and profound and deeply upsetting. The kind of novel I need to reread; but one that will have to wait. I think this one will gain significance over time. Just simply stunning. Makes you think about and examine a whole, vast spectrum of things, but Tartt’s writing about art itself seems particularly stunning and singular.
dark
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I enjoyed this book a lot, and only started tiring of it in the last leg. There’s these weird sections of exposition almost - a lot of worldview stuff randomly. The story is fascinating and somewhat out there. I never really knew where it was going, and I enjoyed the ride. It reminds me of a more dramatic Boyhood (the movie).
I do have a few small critiques of it:
1) Too many semi-central characters die, by the time you get to Andy and his dad, it just feels a little ridiculous like “lemme guess - their dead?”
2) the bad guy, mArtin, who is killed by Theo is of course a stereotypical white sociopath. This seems to be a theme for narratives when they have the main protagonist kill someone or do something violent against somebody, they play up the evil of that injured or killed person by making them this mentally ill violent white guy. I never really noticed this either until a Goodreads reviewer pointed it out in the book Kiterunner.
I do have a few small critiques of it:
1) Too many semi-central characters die, by the time you get to Andy and his dad, it just feels a little ridiculous like “lemme guess - their dead?”
2) the bad guy, mArtin, who is killed by Theo is of course a stereotypical white sociopath. This seems to be a theme for narratives when they have the main protagonist kill someone or do something violent against somebody, they play up the evil of that injured or killed person by making them this mentally ill violent white guy. I never really noticed this either until a Goodreads reviewer pointed it out in the book Kiterunner.
I am really sorry because I'm clearly going against the crowd here, but I found the book overly long when it really could have been concise. I found no sympathy or empathy for the main character in any way, shape, or form, and frankly, the last few pages of the book which go into a trippy philosophy of life and whatever else was just painful.