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A review by thebarandthebookcase
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
5.0
This is the book that reinvigorated my love for reading. I have always been a bookworm - I remember when I was a kid I would never leave the house without a R.L. Stine book in my hand. Law school kind of dulled my reading habits as I didn’t really have the headspace or time to read for fun. However, The Secret History completely changed that.
I read this one about two years ago after a trip to Portland. I visited Powell’s City of Books for the first time and found a used copy (if you haven’t been Powell’s, go book your flight!). I started reading on my flight home and could not put it down. When I finished, I ran to reddit and created a discussion thread, something I had never done before. I found that this one is widely acclaimed, for good reason!
Here’s a mini-synopsis: The novel follows six college students studying Greek classics together at a small and elite college in Vermont. Their studies become all-consuming, resulting in the group to killing one of their members by pushing him off of a cliff. This isn’t a spoiler - the murder is revealed in the first sentence of the novel. The reader then figures out why the murder occurred and its consequences.
I wish I wrote this book. It’s simply perfect in my eyes. The story is told beautifully and there’s really not a day that goes by where I don’t think about it. Every book I read is inevitably and unjustifiably compared to it, as I am eagerly awaiting another novel that will rock me like this one did. I don’t know if I’ll find one, but I’m content with that. I admittedly haven’t read Donna Tartt’s other two novels. I’m weirdly nervous to read them as my expectations are HIGH. They’re sitting on my shelf, so I will tackle them very soon!
I read this one about two years ago after a trip to Portland. I visited Powell’s City of Books for the first time and found a used copy (if you haven’t been Powell’s, go book your flight!). I started reading on my flight home and could not put it down. When I finished, I ran to reddit and created a discussion thread, something I had never done before. I found that this one is widely acclaimed, for good reason!
Here’s a mini-synopsis: The novel follows six college students studying Greek classics together at a small and elite college in Vermont. Their studies become all-consuming, resulting in the group to killing one of their members by pushing him off of a cliff. This isn’t a spoiler - the murder is revealed in the first sentence of the novel. The reader then figures out why the murder occurred and its consequences.
I wish I wrote this book. It’s simply perfect in my eyes. The story is told beautifully and there’s really not a day that goes by where I don’t think about it. Every book I read is inevitably and unjustifiably compared to it, as I am eagerly awaiting another novel that will rock me like this one did. I don’t know if I’ll find one, but I’m content with that. I admittedly haven’t read Donna Tartt’s other two novels. I’m weirdly nervous to read them as my expectations are HIGH. They’re sitting on my shelf, so I will tackle them very soon!