2024 Book Review #30:The Secret History

 

If you're looking for a quick "beach read", this is not it.

If you're looking for an easy mystery with simple language, this is not it.

If you're looking for a well written literary piece of work with a larger than average vocabulary and a slow pace but excellent writing, this is it. 

This book was recommended by my oldest daughter. 

I started to think it would be similar to Dead Poets Society. Nope. 

I started to think there were elements of Lord of the Flies. Sorta. 

I started to think this author is super deep and somewhat cerebral. Yup. 

STORY SUMMARY

In the very exclusive, private New England college called Hampdon, there is a group of very clever, very intelligent and very eccentric students.  There are six of them. They study under the influence of a charismatic type classics professor.  His way of thinking is a world and a life away from the more banal contemporaries of these 6 students.  Their names are Henry, who is sort of the "ring leader", Bunny aka Edmund, the twins Charles and Camilla, Francis, and Richard.  Richard's voice is the one who tells the story. 

The college itself is somewhat isolated....set in rural Vermont. 

And these 6 students  isolate themselves from the main student body. Julian, their classics professor only teaches these 6 students. They all come together for the classes.  They are forbidden to take other classes with other professors. And none of them really socialize with anyone outside their little circle, except for Bunny. 

On the weekends they all go to Francis' country house which is in an even more remote part of town. There is only the groundskeeper there. They begin to have some warped views on morality.  Four of them dabble in the bacchanal and when a man...a local farmer.....turns up dead at their hands...they feel no remorse. They become obsessed about their futures instead of feeling guilty and going to the police. They all feel safe about any consequences until Bunny begins to have a different perspective on things. 

Henry is the manipulator; Camilla and Charles are involved in violence and incest; Francis is full of shame regarding his homosexual feelings; and Bunny makes homophobic and racist remarks all the time. That leaves Richard. Richard...who just wants to fit in and who secretly is in love with Camilla. 

They're on a search for the transcendent.  Yet this search brings them down a dangerous path.  It's beyond the human construct of morality. One of them will die. They will all suffer from the perils of reality vs illusion.  Of the consequences of secrets. 

MY THOUGHTS

This is a deep read.  This would be too much for the average American  high school student or even the average English teacher, but if you love reading deep literature which is somewhat "gothic" in nature, then I do recommend this.  It's more of a college level piece of literature in my opinion, and would probably be interesting to an advanced honors English Lit teacher of advanced high school students or college level literature students. Because I excelled in literature, I was drawn to this book and because my oldest daughter recommended it, I had to stick with it. 

The first 2 chapters were a bit slow  to me. Yet I was drawn in. There is a lot to digest, both in the content and in the writing style. It's deep. It's dark.

It's a good look at the cost and weight of keeping secrets. 

It's all about relationships and how secrets can destroy those relationships. 

There is a twist of a typical tragedy.....kind of like a Greek tragedy.  Julian leaves because he can't face the reality of the situations and doesn't want to face the consequences.  And Henry just wants to be viewed as a tragic Greek hero. 

Richard, honestly, is the sane one. The one who keeps everyone together, until he can't. 

I started getting irritated with these characters....they're clearly searching for something.....it takes forever for them to realize that what they have done is not good...that they really weren't justified in what they did (or didn't do). 

This book is eerily mysterious.  It's a tragedy with a lot of intellectual thought. But at the same time, it's pedantic in spots.  Each chapter is very long and the entire book has only 8  chapters.  Even the Epilogue is too long. I was completely drawn in at the beginning because you begin knowing the secret. Yet then.....it drags!! Yet ....I felt compelled to keep going. 

Main themes are:  relationships/friendships; manipulation; alcoholism; drug use; incest; premarital sex; murder; suicide; reality vs illusion

In my opinion, this book is appropriate for ages 18 and older. 

On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest, I rate this an 8.