Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #122840 in Books
• Published on: 2006-01-26
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 672 pages

Synopsis
A misfit at an exclusive New England college, Richard finds kindred spirits in the five eccentric students of his ancient Greek class. But his new friends have a horrific secret. When blackmail and violence threaten to blow their privileged lives apart, they drag Richard into the nightmare that engulfs them. And soon they enter a terrifying heart of darkness from which they may never return.

Customer Reviews

Padded and Disappointing
Like some other reviewers of The Secret History, I was intrigued by the swathes of commendations for this story. It is categorised as a modern classic so I was eager to find out if the hype was worthy.

The story follows Richard Papen, a college student enrolled at a Hampden College. He is at first isolated but is soon accepted into a small clique of rather curious and dubious individuals. Studying classics, they all fall under the guise of tutor and teacher Julian Morrow. Soon, friendship within the group is strained and one particular, infuriating individual ends up dead.

When I was around 200 pages into this book, I began to get frustrated with the slow and often digressive story line. Half way through, it became apparent to me that the author was intent on making this book 600 plus pages - and like other reviewers who have criticised this book, it is the book's length that is the main problem. At least 150/200 pages could have been omitted, when the the author decided to tell all sorts of irrelevancies. At times, pages were just 'used up' to make it longer. This is as much an editorial fault as an author's but to me it was costly - the book was padded and the storyline suffered.

There are problems with Tartt's plot and characters. This is anything but plot centric. I can accept a few coincidences in a story and any story has to be granted some leeway, (which I gave The Secret History), but after a while, there were far too many coincidences and it soon degenerated into implausibility. For instance, the part where Bunny falls asleep at Henry's house and then wakes on the group's return (in robes!) was one of many examples. The only real character to work was Julian Morrow and Tartt decided to omit him for most of the book. Charles and Camilla were unbelievable as was Francis. And then there was Richard, who really I never found very convincing - the clever Richard, who was happy to sleep in sub-minus temperatures without seeking help. Some scholar! Henry was more convincing but at the same time, flawed.

Tartt did write the book well, even if it is a bit overwritten at times. Sadly this book did become pretty boring in parts, and really I was left disappointed and let down by a somewhat rambling prose, which was designed to lead you somewhere but in its entirety, it never did.

The Secret History will delight everybody
This is one of those rare books, an intelligent and complex literary novel that remains eminently readable. The claustrophobic Gothic setting of a New Hampshire College provides the backdrop for this psychological tale of friendship and murder. The characters are intimately and realistically drawn, so believable you feel as though you have known them for years. Reading it, I found myself discussing their personality traits as though they were old friends. But this is the disturbingly believable story of a privileged group of students who push the boundaries too far. As the author observes, beauty is terror, and there's plenty here of each. Donna Tartt has created a masterpiece. This is a modern classic drawn from antiquity that will take you on a journey of epic proportions. At six-hundred pages it is not nearly long enough, I wanted it to go on forever.

overwritten and pretentious
This was a recommended book, bought for me as a present so I manfully read it to the end.
I disliked it intensely, finding it pretentious and overwritten. In addition to this, the charcters were all
Perhaps it is my fault...I'll go back to the classics, or read modern novels only if they do not purport to be great works...