The Secret History
A Novel
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The Secret History
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Narrated by:
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Donna Tartt
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By:
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Donna Tartt
About this listen
A READ WITH JENNA BOOK CLUB PICK • INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • A contemporary literary classic and "an accomplished psychological thriller... absolutely chilling" (Village Voice), from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Goldfinch.
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.
“A remarkably powerful novel [and] a ferociously well-paced entertainment.... Forceful, cerebral, and impeccably controlled.”—The New York Times
©2023 Penguin Random House Audio (P)2023 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Editorial review
By Kat Johnson, Audible Editor
THE SECRET HISTORY WAS ALWAYS ABOUT THE AESTHETICS
I’m old enough to remember the publication of The Secret History, back in 1992. Like Zadie Smith’s White Teeth almost a decade later, it was one of those rare Publishing Events, when a debut author and novel arrived so authentically entwined that everyone agreed—a literary star was born. Tartt, in men’s pajamas or a necktie and sleek bob, commanded attention. So did the novel, with its premise of murder among classics students at an elite liberal arts college. The Secret History was instantly heralded as an icon of its era. Who knew that, 30 years later, it would perform the same feat for a new generation?
I tore through The Secret History as soon as it came out. Like its narrator Richard Papen, I was a middle-class teenager thrust into a rarified academic world—in my case, a Swiss boarding school instead of a Vermont college—populated by the rich international set. I also wanted to be a writer, and The Secret History set a bar that seemed impossibly high. It’s not one of those novels that makes you think "I can do that"—quite the opposite. It’s simultaneously a complex inverted mystery (like Columbo, it starts with whodunit and then tantalizingly drips out the why and how) and a modern Greek tragedy with characters and prose so compelling, it’s positively hypnotic. I was envious and smitten, and I couldn’t stop reading.
Richard is a California native who is new to both the East Coast and Hampden College, where he’s trying to hide a mediocre background and lack of wealth. In a stroke of luck, he’s invited to join the school’s selective Ancient Greek program, run by charismatic professor Julian Morrow and comprised of five other students. Bunny Corcoran is an all-American preppy type, at home with money and privilege in the style of the Kennedys. Cecilia and Charles are beautiful blond twins with a mysterious relationship and, despite Richard’s love for them, a predilection for offhand cruelty. Henry Winter, tall and reserved, is a polymath and polyglot who’s the smartest and most complicated of the bunch. And there’s red-headed Francis, always wearing a billowing cloak or a pince-nez, who likes boys but is essentially closeted due to the times and his extremely traditional, wealthy family.
These are the main players in a murder that ends with Bunny dead at the bottom of a cliff and buried by snow—hardly a spoiler, since Tartt provides this information in the novel’s exquisitely chilling prologue. In part one, the novel rebuilds beautifully to the climax of the deadly event, while the second part deals with its aftermath, its meditations on beauty, ecstasy, morality, and the taint of murder so seductive that it demands and rewards multiple readings.
Continue reading Kat's review >
Critic reviews
"A beautifully written story, well-told, funny, sad, scary, and impossible to leave alone until I finished. . . . What a debut!"—John Grisham
"Powerful . . . Enthralling . . . A ferociously well-paced entertainment."—The New York Times
"An accomplished psychological thriller . . . Absolutely chilling . . . Tartt has a stunning command of the lyrical."—The Village Voice
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 251
Anders is an angry, cynical man. A book critic known for his scathing reviews, he finds any excuse to dismiss, belittle, or insult. This afternoon is no more agitating than the next. Angers finds himself in a long line at the bank, waiting to reach a teller. Even after two men - wearing masks and carrying guns - take control of the building, Anders is unfazed. It's this behavior that lands him with a pistol against his stomach and a man screamingin his face. And when the bank robber, indignant over Anders' behavior, shoots the book critic in the head, his mind floats through the memories of his life, settling on one particular event....
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5 out of 5 stars
-
The Perfect Example
- By Sarah on 08-01-17
By: Tobias Wolff
-
Strong Motion
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: Scott Aiello
- Length: 20 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 223
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 193
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 196
Louis Holland arrives in Boston in a spring of ecological upheaval (a rash of earthquakes on the North Shore) and odd luck: the first one kills his grandmother. Louis tries to maintain his independence, but falls in love with a Harvard seismologist whose discoveries about the earthquakes' cause complicate everything.
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3 out of 5 stars
-
Compelling Story, Ridiculous Narrator
- By DianeReads on 02-28-16
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
The Lost Weekend
- By: Charles Jackson
- Narrated by: Donald Corren
- Length: 9 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 84
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 79
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 76
It is 1936, and on the East Side of Manhattan, a would-be writer named Don Birnam decides to have a drink. And then another, and then another, until he's in the midst of what becomes a five-day binge. A classic tale of one man's struggle with alcoholism, this revolutionary novel remains Charles Jackson's best-known book - a daring autobiographical work that paved the way for contemporary addiction literature.
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5 out of 5 stars
-
What a terrific audiobook!
- By Bill on 11-10-14
By: Charles Jackson
-
Our Story Begins
- New and Selected Stories
- By: Tobias Wolff
- Narrated by: Anthony Heald
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 193
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 141
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 136
Wolff here returns with fresh revelations - about biding one's time, or experiencing first love, or burying one's mother - that come to a variety of characters in circumstances at once everyday and extraordinary. A retired Marine enrolls in college while her son trains for Iraq. A lawyer takes a difficult deposition. An American in Rome indulges the Gypsy who's picked his pocket.
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5 out of 5 stars
-
Great
- By chris on 04-11-08
By: Tobias Wolff
-
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules (Unabridged Selections)
- By: Edited by David Sedaris
- Narrated by: David Sedaris, Mary-Louise Parker, Cherry Jones
- Length: 2 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 363
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 220
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 221
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules is a collection of short stories, some classic, others impending, selected and introduced by David Sedaris.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Great stories but only 5 of 17 are included
- By Terri Kirk on 07-13-12
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Outside Looking In
- A Novel
- By: T. C. Boyle
- Narrated by: Johnathan McClain
- Length: 14 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 202
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 185
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 183
In 1943, LSD is synthesized in Basel. Two decades later, a coterie of grad students at Harvard are gradually drawn into the inner circle of renowned psychologist and psychedelic drug enthusiast Timothy Leary. Fitzhugh Loney, a psychology PhD student, and his wife, Joanie, become entranced by the drug’s possibilities such that their “research” becomes less a matter of clinical trials and academic papers and instead turns into a freewheeling exploration of mind expansion, group dynamics, and communal living.
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5 out of 5 stars
-
STORYTELLING AS CONSCIOUSNESS-RAISING
- By Christopher Meeks on 05-25-19
By: T. C. Boyle
-
Bullet in the Brain
- By: Tobias Wolff
- Narrated by: Anthony Heald
- Length: 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 281
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 253
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 251
Anders is an angry, cynical man. A book critic known for his scathing reviews, he finds any excuse to dismiss, belittle, or insult. This afternoon is no more agitating than the next. Angers finds himself in a long line at the bank, waiting to reach a teller. Even after two men - wearing masks and carrying guns - take control of the building, Anders is unfazed. It's this behavior that lands him with a pistol against his stomach and a man screamingin his face. And when the bank robber, indignant over Anders' behavior, shoots the book critic in the head, his mind floats through the memories of his life, settling on one particular event....
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
The Perfect Example
- By Sarah on 08-01-17
By: Tobias Wolff
-
Strong Motion
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: Scott Aiello
- Length: 20 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 223
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 193
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 196
Louis Holland arrives in Boston in a spring of ecological upheaval (a rash of earthquakes on the North Shore) and odd luck: the first one kills his grandmother. Louis tries to maintain his independence, but falls in love with a Harvard seismologist whose discoveries about the earthquakes' cause complicate everything.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Compelling Story, Ridiculous Narrator
- By DianeReads on 02-28-16
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
The Lost Weekend
- By: Charles Jackson
- Narrated by: Donald Corren
- Length: 9 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 84
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 79
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 76
It is 1936, and on the East Side of Manhattan, a would-be writer named Don Birnam decides to have a drink. And then another, and then another, until he's in the midst of what becomes a five-day binge. A classic tale of one man's struggle with alcoholism, this revolutionary novel remains Charles Jackson's best-known book - a daring autobiographical work that paved the way for contemporary addiction literature.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
What a terrific audiobook!
- By Bill on 11-10-14
By: Charles Jackson
-
Wonder Boys
- By: Michael Chabon
- Narrated by: David Colacci
- Length: 11 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 740
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 660
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 660
A wildly successful first novel made Grady Tripp a young star, and seven years later he still hasn't grown up. He's now a writing professor in Pittsburgh, plummeting through middle age, stuck with an unfinishable manuscript, an estranged wife, a pregnant girlfriend, and a talented but deeply disturbed student named James Leer.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A strong, early Chabon (sounds like grading wine)
- By Darwin8u on 03-09-14
By: Michael Chabon
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Secret Smile
- By: Nicci French
- Narrated by: Anne Flosnik
- Length: 9 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 62
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 52
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 53
Miranda's sister Kerri has a new boyfriend. He's a handsome charmer who seems to dote on Kerri. But Brendan isn't the man he says he is. Miranda should know. She broke off her own affair with him just a few weeks ago when she found him reading her diary.
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1 out of 5 stars
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I want my 9 hours back
- By Ashley on 07-19-23
By: Nicci French
-
A Doubter's Almanac
- A Novel
- By: Ethan Canin
- Narrated by: David Aaron Baker
- Length: 19 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 235
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 209
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 210
Milo Andret is born with an unusual mind. A lonely child growing up in the woods of Northern Michigan in the 1950s, he gives little thought to his own talent. But with his acceptance at UC Berkeley, he realizes the extent - and the risks - of his singular gifts. California in the '70s is a seduction, opening Milo's eyes to the allure of both ambition and indulgence. The research he begins there will make him a legend; the woman he meets there - and the rival he meets alongside her - will haunt him for the rest of his life.
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4 out of 5 stars
-
The curse of genius?
- By Bonny on 03-03-16
By: Ethan Canin
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Mr. Fox
- A Novel
- By: Helen Oyeyemi
- Narrated by: Carol Boyd
- Length: 8 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 108
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 94
-
Story3.5 out of 5 stars 96
Fairy-tale romances end with a wedding and the fairy tales don't get complicated. In this book, celebrated writer Mr. Fox can't stop himself from killing off the heroines of his novels, and neither can his wife, Daphne. It's not until Mary, his muse, comes to life and transforms him from author into subject that his story begins to unfold differently....
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2 out of 5 stars
-
A Great Novel, just Poor for Audio
- By James A. Dittes on 08-13-16
By: Helen Oyeyemi
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Stories
- All-New Tales
- By: Neil Gaiman - author/editor, Al Sarrantonio - editor, Joe Hill, and others
- Narrated by: Anne Bobby, Jonathan Davis, Katherine Kellgren, and others
- Length: 18 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 889
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 694
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 694
The best stories pull readers in and keep them turning the pages, eager to discover more—to find the answer to the question: "And then what happened?" The true hallmark of great literature is great imagination, and as Neil Gaiman and Al Sarrantonio prove with this outstanding collection, when it comes to great fiction, all genres are equal.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Something for Everyone
- By Nicole on 05-24-17
By: Neil Gaiman - author/editor, and others
-
Koko
- Blue Rose Trilogy, Book 1
- By: Peter Straub
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 22 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 365
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 330
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 333
KOKO. Only four men knew what it meant. Now they must stop it. They are Vietnam vets — a doctor, a lawyer, a working stiff, and a writer. Very different from each other, they are nonetheless linked by a shared history and a single shattering secret. Now, they have been reunited and are about to embark on a quest that will take them from Washington, D.C., to the graveyards and fleshpots of the Far East to the human jungle of New York.
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2 out of 5 stars
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7 hours in and I am done
- By bionichands on 01-26-12
By: Peter Straub
-
The Bell Jar
- By: Sylvia Plath
- Narrated by: Maggie Gyllenhaal
- Length: 7 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 8,902
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 7,929
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 7,900
The Bell Jar chronicles the crack-up of Esther Greenwood: brilliant, beautiful, enormously talented, and successful but slowly going under - maybe for the last time. Sylvia Plath masterfully draws the reader into Esther's breakdown with such intensity that Esther's insanity becomes completely real and even rational, as probable and accessible an experience as going to the movies. Such deep penetration into the dark and harrowing corners of the psyche is an extraordinary accomplishment and has made The Bell Jar a haunting American classic.
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5 out of 5 stars
-
A must-read for every woman
- By Julie W. Capell on 05-06-16
By: Sylvia Plath
-
A Nail Through The Heart
- A Poke Rafferty Thriller
- By: Timothy Hallinan
- Narrated by: Victor Bevine
- Length: 10 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 521
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 443
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 441
Poke Rafferty was writing offbeat travel guides for the young and terminally bored when Bangkok stole his heart. Now the American expat is assembling a new family with Rose, the former go-go dancer he wants to marry, and Miaow, the tiny, streetwise urchin he wants to adopt. But trouble in the guise of good intentions comes calling just when everything is beginning to work out.
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5 out of 5 stars
-
Ever been to Bangkok?
- By Richard Delman on 12-11-11
By: Timothy Hallinan
-
The Keep
- The Adversary Cycle, Book 1
- By: F. Paul Wilson
- Narrated by: Ralph Lister
- Length: 15 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 803
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 700
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 701
"Something is murdering my men." Thus reads the message received from a Nazi commander stationed in a small castle high in the remote Transylvanian Alps. Invisible and silent, the enemy selects one victim per night, leaving the bloodless and mutilated corpses behind to terrify its future victims. When an elite SS extermination squad is dispatched to solve the problem, the men find something that's both powerful and terrifying. Panicked, the Nazis bring in a local expert on folklore - who just happens to be Jewish - to shed some light on the mysterious happenings.
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5 out of 5 stars
-
At long last, The classic horror novel on Audible
- By Shieldslinger on 07-22-20
By: F. Paul Wilson
-
A Good Idea
- By: Cristina Moracho
- Narrated by: Alex McKenna
- Length: 10 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 37
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 33
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 33
Finley and Betty's close friendship survived Fin's ninth-grade move from their coastal Maine town to Manhattan. Calls, letters, and summer visits continued to bind them together, and in the fall of their senior year, they both applied to NYU, planning to reunite for good as roommates. Then Betty disappears.
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5 out of 5 stars
-
An absolute must listen/read!
- By Mel on 03-05-17
By: Cristina Moracho
-
Marjorie Morningstar
- By: Herman Wouk
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 28 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 523
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 444
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 441
Marjorie Morningstar is a love story. It presents one of the greatest characters in modern fiction: Marjorie, the pretty 17-year-old who left the respectability of New York's Central Park West to join the theater, live in the teeming streets of Greenwich Village, and seek love in the arms of a brilliant, enigmatic writer.
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3 out of 5 stars
-
Great story with really cheesy narration
- By James on 05-05-12
By: Herman Wouk
-
The Best Horror of the Year, Volume 4
- By: Ellen Datlow - author/editor, Stephen King, Peter Straub
- Narrated by: Meredith Mitchell, Rebecca Mitchell, Michael Healy, and others
- Length: 16 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 220
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 201
-
Story3.5 out of 5 stars 200
With tales from Laird Barron, Stephen King, John Langan, Peter Straub, and many others, and featuring Datlow’s comprehensive overview of the year in horror, now, more than ever, The Best Horror of the Year provides the petrifying horror fiction readers have come to expect - and enjoy.
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1 out of 5 stars
-
Only a few decent stories in this bunch.
- By Jerry on 12-06-14
By: Ellen Datlow - author/editor, and others
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