I loved the Goldfinch. Loved it. I think it's one of my favorite books ever. I don't understand how the same person wrote this.
The secret history is spectacularly boring, with ridiculously unlikable characters who don't even seem like plausible humans.
Richard is inexplicably drawn to this cast of pretentious assholes who accidentally, or maybe on purpose, killed someone. And he seems determined to fit in with them for god knows what reason. He almost dies from hypothermia because he's an idiot and doesn't ask anyone for help, and then seems really really determined to get involved in another murder for no reason. He's not the one being blackmailed, and the blackmailer and blackmailee deserve whatever dumb hell they have built for themselves.
I should have stopped reading. 18% into the novel my note was "Where are we going? Rich kids do greek class is all I got". There's no payoff.
1 star.
