Reviews tagging 'Domestic abuse'

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

341 reviews

themis_biblos's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense medium-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

4.25

 [It was] my own fatal tendency to try to make interesting people good. 

 I loved Donna Tartt's writing. I was absolutely absorbed in these terribly pretentious, unlikeable characters' lives. That's probably also why it was so horribly depressing. I'll keep some passages I loved most, but otherwise this book has to go into the freezer. I am disturbed.

 The Greeks had a passion for order and symmetry, but they knew how foolish it was to deny emotion, darkness, barbary. 
 The more cultivated a person is, the more repressed, then the more he needs some method of channeling the primitive impulses he's worked so hard to subdue. Otherwise those powerful old forces will mass and strengthen until they are violent enough to break free, more violent for the delay. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Gun violence, Homophobia, Incest, Misogyny, Murder, Toxic friendship, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Self harm, Blood, Grief, and Suicide attempt

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Car accident, and Death of parent

shaleen64's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

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

3.75

Donna Tartt’s writing is unmatched, her character building is exceptional, and this is why her novels are as long as they are.

The characters are all vastly different and mostly wholly unlikeable, however I found Richard’s drive to fit in relatable but particularly sad when considering the final scenes, and Francis’s character heartbreaking due to his inability to ever be his true self.

The story is much more than a group of rich college students committing crimes, but the true story is written in between the lines and for this reason I think it would be better on a second read or even more so analysing the book.

The only reason I’ve not rated higher is because of how I rank this book with Donna Tartt’s The Goldfinch, but would still recommend it to selected people.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Homophobia, Mental illness, Sexism, Medical content, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Incest, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Vomit, Religious bigotry, and Classism

Minor: Rape and Death of parent

moonagedaydreamer's review against another edition

challenging emotional mysterious reflective relaxing slow-paced

• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Homophobia, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Suicide, Blood, Murder, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

helhas3letters's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional 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

1.75

Never have I read about a group of people so pretentious yet so vapid, so snobbish yet so thick, so self-involved yet so empty, so exhausting yet so inexcusably BORING.

Not a single one of these characters is likeable (perhaps maybe Georges LaForgue), so I just did not care one bit about what happened to them. And what on earth is with everyone

being utterly obsessed with and casually kissing Camilla?!? This woman is apparently a prop for everyone else to project their desires onto.

An awful lot of male gaze for a book written by a woman.

In terms of the plot, it’s incredibly repetitive and moves frustratingly slowly. Aside from the two or three main events that take place in this story, there is just far too much waiting around, moving back and forth between locations, and nothing happening for my liking. I honestly don’t understand the point of large chunks of this novel, nor certain characters who do not affect the story or world whatsoever.

I thought the ending was pretty bizarre too. Why did it become a

“where are they now”? And why does it include the most random characters?! Including the cat we were introduced to about 20 pages ago?!? To be fair, I cared more about that cat than I did most of the main characters, but still. A strange choice.

Some people love this book but for me, I can’t help but feel it was a massive waste of time. I kept hoping it would get better, but for 600 pages, it never did. I persisted past where it would have been sensible to give up and in the future, I will trust my DNF instincts.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Drug abuse, Drug use, Racial slurs, Suicide, Violence, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Cursing, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Incest, Physical abuse, Racism, Self harm, Xenophobia, Blood, Antisemitism, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Animal death, Domestic abuse, Infidelity, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Vomit, Death of parent, Outing, and Classism

ambivalentneb's review against another edition

dark reflective 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

2.5

I have conflicting feelings, I usually prefer more metaphysical or ponderous books but The Secret History is more of following events in real time in dialogue with little introspection. It is my own taste but I feel like without the introspection and thoughts of characters the impact of the book and moral is diminished. This is my opinion immediately after finishing though, it may change.

UPD: I also found the gaps of just minor events and excessive drinking and drugs to be quite banal. The main interesting stretches are the first 100 pages and the last 100, the rest is just fluff that fails to be fluff. Also many of the characters are underdeveloped, Camilla is just an aloof female love interest, Francis is just a stereotypical preppy twink and Charles is just a guy who gets drunk. Overall just give more explicit reflection and development; I really don’t care how Charles tapped that on Francis or the drug endeavors of Hampden. I want defined moral reflection. It could’ve been so much more.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Domestic abuse, Incest, and Panic attacks/disorders

Minor: Suicide and Suicide attempt

withlivjones's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

4.5

“The characters are all so weird it’s unrealistic” what if I told you Classics students really are Like That 

For real though I understand why this book is a modern classic, it gets pretty tangential at times which really slows it down but it is so atmospheric and provides such detailed portraits of all the central characters, and the ending had me GAGGED. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Gun violence, Homophobia, Misogyny, Racism, Suicide, and Murder

Moderate: Animal death, Domestic abuse, Incest, Grief, and Suicide attempt

shellocopter's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Incest, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Suicide attempt, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

anneroza's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Alcoholism, Death, Drug use, Gore, Gun violence, Incest, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Blood, Suicide attempt, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism

Minor: Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Forced institutionalization, and Kidnapping

sunlitridges's review against another edition

mysterious tense slow-paced

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

4.25

My rating for this one keeps getting higher and higher bc while it didn't originally seem spectacular to me, I find myself thinking about it in my spare time immediately started re-reading to see if I can pick up on any details I previously missed. Also wonderful descriptions from the author. I'll likely read of few times 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Self harm, Murder, Toxic friendship, and Alcohol

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Murder, and Classism

Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Domestic abuse, Incest, Panic attacks/disorders, Rape, and Stalking

_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.

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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