The Secret History
by Donna Tartt

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Book Reviews of The Secret History

Book Review: "We only begin to live when we conceive life as tragedy"
Summary: 3 Stars

The story is narrated by the newest addition to this pseudo-aristocratic group, Richard, a typical California kid who travels to the secluded hills of Vermont to pursue educational endeavors and escape his mundane, middle class family life. Upon arrival to this prestigious university, he quickly learns the existence of this mystical society that studies classics and has only one teacher for it's entire curriculum. Despite warnings from seemingly 'normal' peers and teachers, young Richard is obsessionately determined to be accepted by this exotic sub-culture. Through him we are slowly acquainted the other obscure characters and their diabolical secret history. To the surprise of the rest of the college, Richard gains acceptance into the elite society, but he still feels excluded on many levels. Wtih the nagging notion that things aren't exactly as they seem (even to an insider), Richard tries to make all the members accept him and bestow their confidence in him. Eventually, Richard gets his way, but his knowledge of covert behaviors and cherished secrets forces him to become more deeply entangled in their activities and causes him to participate in otherwise inconceivable exploits. Throughout the novel we witness our narrator's loss of innocence and refreshing naivety and watch as he painfully ascertains the meaning of the opening quote.

Despite it's seemingly captivating homicide scandal, SH is not a mystery; it is not a thrilling nor suspenseful novel, though it does have it's engaging, charismatic characters, a little bit of sexually provocative situations, and some undeniably funny circumstances all readers can relate to. It has been called Intellectual, a thinking man's novel, but I didn't find that either. Simply because a novel is based on intellectual characters and an academic subject matter, it doesn't qualify as an educational novel. It's style has been compared to that of the 'Great Gatsby', however I wasn't quite as impressed; I thought the novel was decent, but I would hardly compare it to such a literary masterpiece. What I did find was a touching story and a somewhat philosophical abstract on one's creation of identity. One of my favorite quotes from the Secret History was from the prophetic teacher Julian who told his students, "Our own selves make us most unhappy, and that's why we're so anxious to lose them, don't you think?." College years are a very formative find in a person's life (even if you don't go to college) and I think Secret History is a good reflection of the time when we go through switching our identities and becoming the person we want to be, building identities based on traits we strive for and abolishing those we abhor, taking a little from those we admire and putting aside traits of those we don't . In time we find that we may not be able to escape some characteristics innate in our personality and everyone deals with this in a different way. It was interesting to witness the characters in this book face this realism, but not interesting enough to be drawn out for 400 pages. I have heard many claim Secret History to be amongst their personal favorites, and though I found it somewhat mediocre, perhaps you'll disagree and find the insatiableness that I somehow missed.

Literary Books

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