Reviews tagging 'Body horror'

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

77 reviews

wooblatoober's review against another edition

challenging 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? Yes

5.0

WOW!! it was surely a difficult read for me (it took me 2 months) but it was so worth it & i’m so glad my friend made me read it. there are so few books (or authors!!) out there that are so good at leaving me with questions that DON’T MAKE ME ANGRY!! idk what her method is but tartt’s ability to make you wonder & theorize has landed this novel a cult following, because when you’re done reading, all you wanna do is TALK ABOUT IT!! you want to discuss theories with your friends, or what they thought of each character, or watch several 3-hour-long video essays while you clean your room, or follow the tsh reddit page. it gets in your head, partly because it SEEMS SO REAL! characters don’t make moral decisions, but it feels like you’re there and living this story, so not only do you understand why they’re making their decisions—sometimes they seem like the only option. details are included as literary devices, but they also just serve to make the story more realistic. & don’t get me started on the characters. judy poovey is quite possibly the only likeable character in all 628 pages (which is by design, as she seems to serve as a tether to reality in ways), & yet i REALLY LIKE most of the characters despite having flaws that would usually make you HATE someone. i’ve never liked (or enjoyed in any book, for that matter) unlikeable characters at all, let alone this much before. i said it was a difficult read, but i really appreciate its length—apparently, tartt cut out a good portion of tsh before publishing, & thinking about what she might have gotten rid of keeps me up at night. tartt’s literary tools are so well-used, i feel like i can truly analyze this book & its literary devices like im in school again, & it’s so much fun!!

i think i enjoyed reading each character so much because of their complexities, paired with richard’s very limited point of view—one that he (and the reader) doesn’t always realize is so limited. in fact, he doesn’t really every get to have all the information at any one time, illustrated by the hundreds of fan theories from people who have exactly the same amount of information that richard has. so you’re left to unravel characters’ motives and actions with the same amount of information richard has—again, not a lot—& left to understand only what he understands. tartt also doesn’t leave any loose ends—every detail it’s important, & serves to make the story seem more realistic. these things makes it more immersive—like the reader is living it, or hearing a story about a friend, someone they know, something that actually happened that the reader is helping to try to get to the bottom of. it involves the reader in a marvelous way. & this stupid fucking book has me saying prick ass words like ‘marvelous’

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Homophobia, Incest, Misogyny, Sexism, Toxic relationship, Violence, Antisemitism, Grief, Murder, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Sexual assault and Sexual content

Minor: Rape, Religious bigotry, Suicide attempt, and Outing

harlshm's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

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

3.5

Pretty good overall, feels like a book you have to read.

Slow around the two major plot points. A frustration being that everything was wrote in great detail and when you get to important parts of the plot, the character couldn’t remember or had blanked it out. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Suicide attempt, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Incest

_meganrose's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious medium-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? Yes

4.0

Perfect read heading into Fall. Very eerie and cerebral. However, it should be a CRIME to have 30-50+ page chapters. Overall enjoyed this read, but it could’ve been a lot shorter and would’ve been a better reading experience if the chapters weren’t so long.

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Fatphobia, Gore, Homophobia, Incest, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual content, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Murder, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

_david_'s review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious 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

3.5

I somewhat enjoyed the book. 

I liked the niche approach of student choice: the outgoing introverted dark academia type of students of classic languages. This is a group which I can recognise in fellow students from my high school days, who coincidentally also studied classic languages. 

The plot is interesting to me. It's a very believable story of a group of people who make very bad choices which seem the easiest to them in the moment, but which have long lasting consequences.  

One thing I wish the story improved is character depth. The main character and Henry are interesting. Bunny is interesting but not very rounded. But Charles, Camilla and Francis are underdeveloped eventhough they were part of the main cast of characters. The main character's crush on Camilla also made my eyes roll. It was very over the top and often distracted from whatever she was doing. Her appearance got mentioned waaaaay too often. I'd rather have known more about her personality. 

Somewhere around the halfway point the story becomes very slow. You might have to push through long paragraphs about seemingly unimportant details. There shouldn't have been much more of it or I would've dropped the book. Speaking of Tartt's writing style: either do not mind having to look up words or be accepting of only understanding the general gist of a word/foreign sentence and moving on. 

The ending was very satisfying to me. The effect of the events in the story are different per character. I found this very interesting to read about. Something clicked when the main character described that the main cast is a group of naturally insecure people who have been taught to feel superior instead. This explains a lot of the behaviour shown.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcoholism, Death, Gun violence, Self harm, Suicide, Violence, Suicide attempt, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Addiction, Body horror, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gore, Incest, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Medical content, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Bullying, Eating disorder, Toxic relationship, Car accident, and Classism

Drunk driving/drunk drivers/driving under influence Description of thoughts of raping a woman

jemimaesmee's review against another edition

challenging dark tense slow-paced

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

4.0

This was an absolute tome of a book. I have never required so much will-power to complete a read. I find it very difficult to rate because while it is intriguing, well written and unexpected, it is also drawn out and somewhat boring in places too. 

---

Content Warnings

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

Moderate: Body horror, Incest, and Suicide attempt

sakisreads's review against another edition

I felt quite bored trying to read it. I think I unfortunately bought into the BookTok hype 😢 But I will read the synopsis because I have seen some spoilers and they seem dramatic. Sorry! 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Blood, and Classism

bookzplz's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective tense slow-paced

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

4.5

“i’m just having a bit of trouble with my passport.”

i technically started this book in the winter of 2022 and for various reasons, put it down

shortly after bunny’s death

. i think it was a little overhyped and i wasn’t sure what to expect so i decided to leave it there. i’m glad i picked it back up. 

this book does an excellent job of showing the blinders people in academia frequently have on and how the isolation under the guise of supremacy can be detrimental. nobody was ever happy. they studied the classics because it was the thing to do, the only one who concluded their studies was richard because he financially had to and, of course,

was alive to do so

. for most of them, classics was something to study because they could and less so because they were actually interested in the subject. the book also expertly showed the favorite pastime of affluent white people, ignoring things they don’t want to deal with or “sweeping it under the rug”. these people, richard excluded, have no actual experience with dealing with their problems.

when bunny is essentially threatening to go forward with what he suspects about them, they never talk to him about it, they give into his extortion and when that gets too tiring they decide to murder him.

it’s less a secret history of what happened and more so outing the secret ways that the wealthy go about ignoring their problems and finding ways of not dealing with them.

i guarantee you i will read this book again. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Homophobia, Racial slurs, Racism, Suicide, Antisemitism, Grief, and Suicide attempt

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Incest, Violence, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

Minor: Body horror, Gun violence, and Misogyny

mskingbean69's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious sad 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? It's complicated

5.0

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Biphobia, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, Gun violence, Homophobia, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Violence, Islamophobia, Medical content, Grief, Car accident, Suicide attempt, Murder, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

koiolee's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.75

Maybe I'll up the star rating after i mull it all over. But this book was incredibly slow. Wonderful prose and addictive writing. I'm left feeling like I'm a pig trotting through mud. I'm happy, but still going so very slow. I think this book would be wonderful for people interested in classics or Greek for them to cross reference, find lil tidbits, analyze why certain paragraphs were there necessary or even what they're alluding to. Unfortunately that's not me, i did not do that and it was a fine enough read. A bit long, a bit tedious, but not a bad read at all. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Violence, Vomit, Antisemitism, Islamophobia, Medical content, Grief, Religious bigotry, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, and Classism

seforaflorian's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Body horror, Death, Drug use, Gore, Incest, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Toxic relationship, Violence, Grief, Suicide attempt, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol