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    The Secret History: A Read with Jenna Pick
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    The Secret History: A Read with Jenna Pick
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    The Secret History: A Read with Jenna Pick
    Ebook751 pages11 hours

    The Secret History: A Read with Jenna Pick

    By Donna Tartt

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    A READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK • ONE OF TIME MAGAZINE'S 100 BEST MYSTERY AND THRILLER BOOKS OF ALL TIME • INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • A contemporary literary classic and "an accomplished psychological thriller ... absolutely chilling" (Village Voice), from the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Goldfinch.

    One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years

    Under the influence of a charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at a New England college discover a way of thought and life a world away from their banal contemporaries. But their search for the transcendent leads them down a dangerous path, beyond human constructs of morality.

    “A remarkably powerful novel [and] a ferociously well-paced entertainment . . . Forceful, cerebral, and impeccably controlled.” —The New York Times
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRandom House Publishing Group
    Release dateOct 19, 2011
    ISBN9780307765697
    Unavailable
    The Secret History: A Read with Jenna Pick
    Author

    Donna Tartt

    Donna Tartt is a novelist, essayist and critic. Her first novel, The Secret History, has been published in twenty-three countries.

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    Reviews for The Secret History

    4/5

    5,806 ratings268 reviews

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    • 5/5
      I've been meaning to read this for a long time, and especially so after loving The Goldfinch a couple of years ago (although I didn't get on with The Little Friend). The Secret History did not disappoint at all - Donna Tartt's considerable writing talents are showcased to their fullest here, and they seem all the more incredible considering this was her debut!I love her descriptions of people, places and things that can be particularly difficult to describe, like the quality of light at a particular time of day or year. And I particularly admire her knack for making big characters (Bunny in particular) leap off the page through the lens of a not so memorable protagonist.I'm looking forward to seeing what Tartt does next!
    • 5/5
      I've read this book twice, and is on my favorite books list.
    • 5/5
      This book was every bit as excellent as promised. I've actually put off reading it because I was underwhelmed by The Goldfinch and was in no hurry to try another Tartt book. Happily, I loved everything about The Secret History. Really good writing: so descriptive and intense, a well drawn and completely despicable cast of characters, and a fascinating story of murder and mystery. I was riveted from start to finish.
    • 5/5
      Call me weak of the heart, but I rarely reach for books that contain over five-hundred pages, so I’m not entirely sure what came over me when I read The Secret History, but it was a little like love at first sight. Why, I do not know.This gripping, masterpiece of a novel is a little like Dead Poets Society gone wrong. We are led by the narration of our protagonist, Richard, who is a young Californian male lacking ambition. Dropping his plans of a medical career, he enrolls in a Vermont college at which a peculiar group of young students catch his attention. Richard eventually befriends these four boys and one girl, with their antiquated modes of dress and hushed discussions about classical topics, who, he soon learns, are under the wing of a single classics professor named Julian. Julian’s questionable teaching methods have won him a reputation across campus, yet within the walls of his office his students are taken into a world that completely dissolves the boundaries of everyday existence.The crux of the story lies in a grave error that takes place when some of these “clever, eccentric misfits” – as the blurb states – “go beyond the boundaries of normal morality”. Yet this slippage is not a slow descent like the summary promises, but rather a violent crumbling of their ethics and even sanity as they frantically attempt to mend the problem.This debut novel of Donna Tartt is exemplary in its lyricism and demonstrates her ability to masterfully hold the reins of pace over so many pages. Albeit psychologically thrilling, its true beauty rests in its weaving of the elements of the real, the fantasy, the dark, and the dramatic in a mesmerizing novel that effortlessly wins over the hearts of those who celebrate art in its finest form.
    • 2/5
      I did not enjoy this. The writing is fine, and it moves quickly in the second half. But the story, including both the plot and the character development was incredibly predictable and artificial. Perhaps by centering her book around a whole cast of stereotypes, Tartt was trying to convey something meta, but then I missed it.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed this book, although I'm finding it hard to describe. There's a murder, but it's not a mystery in the traditional sense -- you know all along who did it, and you know it's coming before it happens. There's a lot of subtlety here -- the story isn't so much about what happens as it is about what the main character thinks about what might happen. That sounds vague, but I was really fascinated by the subtleties of the author's examination of how a fairly average person might react to murder: the discovery, the motives of those involved, the execution of a plan, the aftermath. Most of the characters other than the narrator were decidedly strange and un-average, but I developed an affection for them nonetheless. I would recommend it to those looking for an intelligent and well-written novel, even though its unconventional style may disappoint those used to fast-paced or suspenseful fiction.
    • 4/5
      It's trash, of course. But irresistible. Still, better when it's ripping off Brideshead Revisited and The Magus than being Rules of Attraction Highsmith.
    • 4/5
      This is an outstanding read. It's not, as I sometimes describe literary fiction, about people and feelings. But neither is it about actions. To begin class, the classics professor says, "Are you ready to leave the phenomenal world, to enter into the sublime?" While things most definitely happen in this story, the heart of the book is less in the actions and more in the experience of being a part of those actions. The narrator is a witness, a participant, and most importantly the lens through which we catch a glimpse of the lived/living experience of the story.
    • 2/5
      Started badly. The voice telling the tale is not attractive. Reading it in an american accent (Arlo Guthrie) does improve the tone but slows down the reading - and I did want to finish this quickly. There's far too much description. Every character is described in detail - physical and background - but there's no way to associate the descriptions or attach them to the characters. I resorted to writing down each character with a list.
      I'm glad this is over - had to skip over quite a lot of the last few chapters. Yet it wasn't that bad - needs cutting down and the plot was not bad although predictable, and only the protagonist ever came to life.... but to be fair maybe that was deliberate to point up the disconnectedness of Richard Papen.
    • 4/5
      This book always seems to be on top 100 lists and I've had a copy for years but never read it. It was OK but I don't understand the top 100 votes.It was slow to start but got better after the initial set up of the story. None of the characters are likeable at all - not that they have to be. But I read it and don't regret doing so. Although I did think she jumped the shark with the incest plotline . I didn't think it was necessary.
    • 2/5
      The Secret History by Donna Tartt has been on my radar for years so I was happy to find out for myself why it's on so many Top 100 lists. Published in the 1990s and set in Hampden College in Vermont, the story is narrated by college student Richard Papen and is essentially the story of what happens to him and his five fellow classics students. On the first page of the Prologue we learn one of them has been murdered.Richard is on a scholarship but his fellow students have wealthy backgrounds and they're all studying Ancient Greek under the exclusive tutelage of a Professor who will only take a limited number of students on at any one time. The novel is peppered with quotes in Greek, and the students are intelligent, rich and somewhat entitled which gives the book an altogether snobbish undertone.The narrator was irritatingly elusive and I wasn't quite sure if this was the point. The novel provided a penetrating character analysis of the friends without ever giving us a clear picture of the narrator and I'm still not sure why. Each of the characters was flawed and unlikeable in their own way and their behaviour was sometimes detestable. I'm just talking about their everyday behaviour here, not the fact that they murdered one of their friends.Given I had little to zero understanding of the classics references contained within the book, I was relieved to discover I could easily follow the mystery through to a satisfactory ending. Although I was left wanting to know more about Henry's past and what happened in the woods. Ultimately, this was a grudging read and a slow-burn. There's much to admire in the writing and the research is impressive, but it just didn't ring my bell. If I wanted a college setting with inspiring references to classic literature and a tragic death I'd turn to Dead Poets Society.
    • 4/5
      Bloomin ace this.
    • 5/5
      Suspenseful, engaging. A real page-turner.
    • 4/5
      THis is SOOOO LONG, but so compelling - an interesting look into how mob mentality can convince someone without strong morals or even a strong path in life to commit a crime. PERFECT example of an unreliable narrator - you only know what he knows and he discovers some things, but he also admits that everything is colored by his own impressions.
    • 3/5
      I have mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, it's very atmospheric and can be very suspenseful at times. On the other hand, it's elevated language sometimes seems out of place, and it can drag during the calmer sections. The first and third sections are quite good while the second was dull and hard to get through. I swear that the characters spend half of their time asking where each other are located (if I had to read "Where's Camilla?" one more time, I was going to abandon the book), and the sentence "[He/She/I] awoke with a start," was used so many times that I would audibly groan every time I heard it.

      The story is good, but this book really could have used a good edit for length. I'm all for long books when there's a lot to say, but so much of the detail was simply unnecessary.
    • 2/5
      I've heard this book compared to A Separate Peace. I didn't like that book very much but I can appreciate the similarities: friendship among rich kids subtly turns sour and even violent in an academic environment. Honestly, there isn't much more to it than that. Our narrator joins an odd clique in college made up of people who study ancient Greek under a particularly charismatic professor, though that professor's influence isn't all that pervasive, really. A lot of key information shows up whenever it's convenient, like "oh by the way, Bunny took an afternoon walk every day, which is important but was never mentioned in the last hundred pages because I didn't think of it until just now." Perhaps the idea behind this was realism, that those sorts of foreshadowing details don't occur to someone sharing their memories (as opposed to, say, writing a movie script), but it made the story feel haphazard. Mostly I was kind of bored. None of the characters were all that likable, and very few of the scenes contributed to the plot or character development. Any tragedy carried no weight because the narrator didn't seem to care one way or the other. Basically, I read it because I'd heard it was good not from friends, but from random internet book lists. Clearly I need to go elsewhere for my recommendations.A note on the audio: This is read by the author, a strange choice given that the narrator and most of the characters are all male. It took me a little while to figure that out.
    • 5/5
      The Secret History mimics a Greek tragedy. Richard Papen, who is studying the Classics is an outsider at a prestigious American college. He manages to become the sixth student in an Ancient Greek class, whose charismatic teacher normally allows only five students to enrol each year. The other five students who have been studying together for some time come from a background of wealth and privilege - not at all like Richard's hard-scrabble upbringing. The murder of one of the members of the group is revealed on the first page. The first half of the book deals with the events leading up to the murder and the murder itself. In the second half, the remainder of the group must deal with the aftermath of the act. Their tightly-knit group swiftly declines into fear, recrimination and remorse.This book could best be described as a psychological thriller. The unravelling of the group is suspenseful and Donna Tartt is such a good writer that I actually found myself caring about people who would normally cause me to raise my eyebrows at their arrogance and entitlement. My only complaint? I would have liked to find out more about their teacher. There are plenty of hints about his control over his students but ultimately he manages to remain at arms-length and walk away from the situation.This is a first novel for the author who goes on to become a Pulitzer Prize winning novelist. I'm not surprised - she is brilliant!
    • 5/5
      ...............how am i supposed to talk about this book. when it's so unique that no words are enough to do it justice.
      i had certain expectations but i definitely did not think i would love it this much. especially after i finished the first half and couldn't imagine what the second half would be about, because pretty much everything had been explained before. i thought it was going to be boring and uninteresting and just really dragged out; to be fair it is quite long. it was none of those things.
      it was just as pretentious as i thought it would be, but each and every sentence felt like it had a purpose, like it wasn't put in the accidentally. the writing style is absolutely phenomenal, it's incredibly atmospheric?? i don't know i just know that it fits so so well to this kind of story.
      my favourite part were the characters, who were so incredibly human, the like of which i haven't encountered before. and of course my favourite was henry, but i have a soft spot for all of them.
      it's not particularly action-driven, it's quite slow and the main focus is always on the characters, but there are times when things happen so fast that you can't really wrap your head around it. and at some points i thought i knew where it was going and i wasn't very satisfied, but every time without fail at the right moment it took an unexpected turn and made me love it even more.
      and then there's the ending. which was. so completely unforeseen on my part. i haven't seen anyone mention that this is one of those books that rips your heart out?? a warning would have been nice?? needless to say it made me cry for a solid 5 minutes. and i don't know how i feel about it.
      now i think i can confidently say that this is my favourite book of all time and i would like to urge everyone to read it. right now. seriously do it. it's the best book.
    • 3/5
      A small liberal arts college in Vermont is the setting for this one. A California kid of modest means hooks up with a very small group of trust fund undergrads and begins to study the classics. In nonlinear fashion, we find out who dies on the first page, and we know who did it and why before the midpoint of the story. Call it an extra credit project that goes horribly wrong. So this thing really isn't a mystery per se. Rather, the first half could be considered to have some mystery elements while the second half would be more of a psychological study of what happens to a closely knit group of people when the unthinkable happens. Overall, I liked the setting and the story, but the characters were just too much. I could handle the fact that the students seemed to have money to burn, as it was made clear that this was a school where rich kids were sent when they didn't have a lot of other options left. But in addition to their rarefied lifestyles, the kids just weren't likable. Not that they were *un*likable, but they just didn't merit the sort of emotional investment that would have kept me concerned and worried about their respective fates. Without exception, each was a selfish, self-absorbed, spoiled, navel-gazing twit who was overly fond of some combination of nicotine, alcohol, and other even worse chemicals. Actually, the fact that I liked them to any extent at all is a testament to Tartt's skills as a writer. Still, it didn't stop me from hoping that one or more of them might end up pancaked by a Greyhound bus, or some such thing. And while that didn't happen to anyone, I was glad that Tartt didn't take an easy or trite way out when it came to the various character resolutions. In short, I was hoping for a lot more from this one, and what I was given was not completely satisfying, with the failings falling entirely on the characterizations side of the equation.
    • 3/5
      I was hooked for the first half of the book, but less so for the second.
    • 4/5
      Reminds me a great deal of The Magus, very dreamlike and sort of foggy. Contrary to many of the reviews I've read, I much prefer the second half of the book. Mainly because Bunny is gone by then and I couldn't stand him. The book is far too long, some of the descriptive passages go on forever, but maybe you'll like that more than I did. Ends just as it should though, and that's saying a lot for such a long, rich story.
    • 4/5
      A good book, but I had a hard time giving it a perfect score because I was bored silly during parts of it. Obviously I'm in the minority...once again!
    • 5/5
      I can't praise this book highly enough. On the one hand it's the story of a young man's coming of age at university, and his growing friendship with a tight-knit group of eccentric classicists. On the other hand it delves into the dark side of the mind to imagine how Greek tragedies might play out nowadays, and how a game can suddenly turn into something quite, quite different. Stimulating and gripping, this is a powerful study of the lengths that we will go to, to be accepted and to confirm our difference.
    • 5/5
      This was a "hump' book for me as I started it in 2017 and finished it today in 2018. I was a fan of The Goldfinch and had been waiting to read this one and I was not disappointed. It is a BIG book in so many ways ....559 pages so physically big but full of plot and a multitude of characters and exposure to literature, philosophy and history and darn good writing that was riveting and engaging and hard to put down. Characters are drawn together around a life changing incident and the repercussions that it has for them. It is at a time of college attendance so all are young, impressionable and needing to belong. The book is referred to as a "mystery" There is a murder in the first few pages (also referred to as a "psychological thriller".) I kept thinking of ...."oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive."It is interesting to do some research about Tartt. She was identified at her local uni (Mississippi) at 18 as having incredible writing talent. Not surprisingly she has a Classics background (present plot). Several people have made a run at the movie rights but nothing has happened so far. According to Wikipedia....."A number of recurring literary themes occur in Tartt's novels, including those related to social class and social stratification, guilt, and aesthetic beauty." Yes indeed!
    • 5/5
      amazingly creepy
    • 2/5
      Not impressed.
    • 5/5
      Odd book. I tried to read it several times because the themes I was told were in it appealed to me, but kept getting bogged down near the beginning. I finally managed to get into it by skimming ahead to just past the point where I had difficulty, and read the rest compulsively.I've never read a book with such a collection of completely self-absorbed, amoral characters. Charles reaction to the first murder: "It wasn't like it was Voltaire we killed, but still, I feel bad." Henry, trying to push the blame on Coke, or Richard, or anyone, really. Bunny, the only one disturbed by the first murder, but casually stealing food, defacing books, his skill for finding others' weak points and pressing them - and his entire family so concerned with their image. The entire student body, even, with their affectation of grief.The structure of the book seemed off. I expected the Dionysian murder to come at the climax. Instead it took place unnoticed by Richard near the beginning, followed by the casual killing of Bunny. And then the breakdown - I think it was the questioning by the police, and the apparent betrayals by Henry, that precipitated them. The breaking of the group, not remorse...
    • 3/5
      "Huh?" This book is tedious. There are memorable characters in an interesting situation but Tartt's delivery is long-winded and wound up in too many Classical allusions for this to be enjoyable.

      Greek tragedy in guise of murder mystery. Unlikable characters, strange situations, not very enjoyable. Perhaps for the classical scholars?
    • 4/5
      Good book.I had read this one years ago. I remember it being a slow, cynical and heavy spiral into the lives of kids at a liberal arts college.I think it has a very Bret Easton Ellis and Great Gatsby vibe to it. No one is a very good person and you just watch these kids spiral out of control.The writing is moody and evocative and you get a great feeling of being a fly on the wall.
    • 3/5
      A group o f college students were in a class learning Greek and other languages. One of them was a misfit and did not get along with the others. What this group did when they were bored was deplorable. The others were remorseful and had repercussions from the event.