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  • The Secret History

  • By: Donna Tartt
  • Narrated by: Donna Tartt
  • Length: 22 hrs and 4 mins
  • 4.3 out of 5 stars (3,462 ratings)
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The Secret History cover art

The Secret History

By: Donna Tartt
Narrated by: Donna Tartt
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Summary

Brought to you by Penguin.

THE BESTSELLER THAT DEFINED AN AGE

Penguin presents the audio edition of The Secret History, read by the author.

'Everything, somehow, fit together; some sly and benevolent Providence was revealing itself by degrees and I felt myself trembling on the brink of a fabulous discovery, as though any morning it was all going to come together---my future, my past, the whole of my life---and I was going to sit up in bed like a thunderbolt and say oh! oh! oh!'

Under the influence of a charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at a New England college discover a way of thought and life a world away from their banal contemporaries. But their search for the transcendent leads them down a dangerous path, beyond human constructs of morality.

©1992 Donna Tartt (P)2010 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

"Haunting, compelling, brilliant." (The Times)

"Irresistible and seductive." (Guardian)

"Enthralling... Forceful, cerebral and impeccably controlled." (New York Times)

What listeners say about The Secret History

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1,945
  • 4 Stars
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  • 3 Stars
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  • 2 Stars
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Performance
  • 4 out of 5 stars
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  • 4 Stars
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  • 3 Stars
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Story
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    1,763
  • 4 Stars
    650
  • 3 Stars
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  • 2 Stars
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  • 1 Stars
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Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

Brilliant book, terribly badly read

Donna Tartt is a fabulous writer. She is a poor reader though, although she adopts the flat monotone favoured by US narrators (particularly authors) convincingly enough. It isn't inspiring though, just boring - and, as mentioned in other reviews here, not a patch on the wonderful Adam Sims version, which you should try to get hold of if you can.

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85 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars

The Secret History

Why oh, oh why do authors feel they can narrate their own books. Here in The Secret History is an excellent example of how bad it can be. Particularly with the main character being male narrated by a woman. With all the hype of this book and I was hugely disappointed and could only make it half way, and even then it was a struggle.

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49 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Accent distracting

Unfortunately I just couldn’t get into the book because of the narration. The accent was very pronounced and I strained to listen at some points. I went against my better judgement for selecting a book read by the author. Lesson learnt

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35 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Great story but....

This is an epic tale, very well crafted and expertly plotted. Unfortunately, as others have already said, the author's narration does not match her writing and I found some stretches quite tedious. It is quite a depressing book but the tension of the key moments is brilliantly done and makes up for the occasional tedium in between. Having also read/listened to The Goldfinch, the style is similar and the characters equally unsympathetic. Nevertheless, I would recommend.

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31 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

fine book & fine narration

This is a very fine and enjoyable book. The author shows great skill in creating a tense, claustrophobic and paranoid atmosphere and in hooking to reader into wanting to know what happens to the fairly unlikeable, self-obsessed group of dysfunctional students.

Unlike some other reviewers, I was pleasantly surprised at how good Donna Tartt was at reading her own book. I too am way about authors reading their own books: writing and narrating are different skills not often found in the same person. Donna Tartt is however an exception. I too have listened to the Adam Sims version, and whilst it is undoubtedly better, I think the author in an odd sort of way better gets under the skin of the main characters - not surprisingly perhaps as she wrote the book! She doesn't maintain the tension and the narrative flow in the same way, possibly because the recording is a bit disjonted - breaks are fairly obvious - but I wouldn't let that put you off. but have a listen to the sample first to make sure you're happy as it is quite a long book.

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30 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars
  • mj
  • 06-09-16

An interesting tale

I found this to be an interesting tale, with a good pace, well written characters and a satisfying end.
I did not like the narration though....the story is from a male point of view yet is read by a female. Also I felt the narrator lacked a certain emotional edge to her voice BUT as she is also the author maybe that is as she wanted it to be?

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19 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

oh so so clever

Wonderfully original constructed story of a plot to commit the perfect murder. A group of four highly priveledged University students are influenced by their studies of ancient Greek. Seen through eyes of the one member of the group who is the disadvantaged outsider. Riveting. An absolute page turner.

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17 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    1 out of 5 stars

Such a disappointment after the Goldfinch

Would you try another book written by Donna Tartt or narrated by Donna Tartt?

I would buy a book but I found the southern drawl of the narrator irritating and grating although I am not American so this may colour my impression

What will your next listen be?

Probably it was Ready Player One

How did the narrator detract from the book?

The accent was annoying (see previous comment)

What character would you cut from The Secret History?

Not sure I can answer this, I didn't really get a feel for each character. Probably I shouldn't have bought this book - certainly if I hadn't loved the Goldfinch so much I might not have.

Any additional comments?

The hook at the beginning of the story seems to have been stuck on as an afterthought - the structure of the story seemed a bit off.

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15 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars
  • L
  • 05-08-16

Stick with it! The book has a very slow start. I wasn't sure if I would confine . It didn't grip.

This was a slow burn. I wondered where it was going and it took me weeks to listen to the first part- it just didn't grip me.
The it began to exert its pull and by the middle I was hooked. You enter their world- a group of privileges students in the Hamptons. Then a dark secret emerges and the book becomes a tense thriller !

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13 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars
  • S
  • 12-03-14

Author - Narrator

It was fascinating to hear Donna Tartt read her own work. Plus side - intimacy and a feeling of how the author perceives her novel. Down side - she has a very limited repertoire of 'voices' and can become monotonous.

The story of a close-knit group of college students under the spell of their Greek tutor and of each other, losing touch with reality and plunging ever deeper the more they try to dig their way out is fascinating and absorbing. On balance I might have preferred an abridgement (the number of times people take a drink or smoke a cigarette becomes endless) and the plot flags a few times but overall it was very enjoyable.

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13 people found this helpful