Rating: 
Summary: Hooks you then leaves much to be desired.
Review: I loved The Secret History, so when I heard that Donna Tartt had a new book out I decided to check it out. I liked the beginning of the novel. About 200 pages in it was a struggle to force myself to read more of it...the end gets a little better but offers little in the way of resolution. I just expected more. The parts of the book about the Ratliff family are especially mindnumbing. I will say that Tartt is an excellent writer, and the only reason that I gave the book even 2 stars. She creates such beautiful sentences and paragraphs, but fails to make much of a story. By the time I finished the book I didn't even like Harriet, let alone any of the other characters in the novel. Also, I REALLY wanted to find out what happened to Robin but his murder is barely talked about past the prologue.
Rating: 
Summary: Pathetic
Review: Last Christmas I ordered a few things from Amazon, and this book was one of them. I first saw it in a teen magazine, and from that summary along with Amazon's summary, I thought it was going to be good. Boy was I wrong. I never read it until this Thanksgiving, and just finished it today, when it normally only takes me a week or less to get through a book. This book had no point, and all the author did was ramble on and on about stupid things. She explained far too much, and jumped around more than a bag of jumping beans. I was very disappointed, and very sorry that my mom spent $15 on this.
Rating: 
Summary: Good Book Hurt by Marketing Ploy
Review: I had the impression, judging from the sinister looking doll on the book's cover and the description of the story as dealing with a twelve-year old girl searching for her brother's killer, that this was going to be some type of horror-suspense novel. What it really is is the story of a most unusual girl growing up in an atmosphere of dysfunction, whether it be within her own family or that of the white trash neighbors. Tartt's prose is mesmerizing, and I love her use of themes (dreams, sleeping, water and rain, etc.) that keep the narrative tied together. Most interesting is the author's refusal to give many of her characters a cut-and-dried type of morality. And yes, in a tongue-in-cheek way, Harriet is a genius.
Rating: 
Summary: Not the sum of its parts
Review: Tartt has said in interviews that it pleases her more if someone says "I like this sentence" rather than "I loved your book." One can't help wondering if it's because she knows the sum is weaker than the parts of The Little Friend. There's no question Tartt can construct sentences that sing and paragraphs that make you go back and reread them for their hyper-observant accuracy. And indeed she has said that the way she writes is to write a sentence and rewrite it, and rewrite it, and rewrite it until she's happy with the way it sounds. She won't move on to the next sentence until that one is satisfactory in tone and rhythm. (This should come as no surprise to those who waited ten years for her sophomore effort.) Attention to detail isn't the beef here; it's precisely why we love to read her writing. But her seeming inability to focus on the whole while scrutinizing and restructuring the parts has produced a novel that is more pleasing to read for its details than for its story. The artful writing in The Little Friend delights fans of language. But the poor storytelling disappoints fans of novels.
Rating:
Summary: A Complete Waste of Time
Review: Let me start off by saying that if they offered a rating lower than one star, I would've rated it so much lower. I started this book because the reviews looked promising and the summary on the back of the book was intriguing. About ten pages into it, though, I got so bored. I was mixing up characters, I forgot who did what because of the rambling, nonsensical story telling. I've never read another book by this author, and I never will. I hate not finishing books and often finish the book just looking for the resolution of the story. This is what happened with this book. I tried to finish it quickly just because I had no interest in it and just wanted to get it over with. By the end of the book, I was so disgusted, I literally threw the book across the room, then had to dump it in the trash. I would NEVER recommend this book to anyone, not even my worst enemy. The plot lines, from the crack-addicted Ratliffs to the murder of Robin to the death of Aunt Libby, I didn't understand a single thing in that book and NONE of the plots ever finished. Rambling, mind-numbingly boring, complete and utter crap. Spend your money on something more worthwhile.
Rating: 
Summary: Right Up There With To Kill A Mockingbird
Review: Subtle, powerful, and full of the languid and long moments of childhood, this southern mystery is not for the reader who wants a cheap thrill, Each character is drawn carefully and completely with the plot woven around them until there is no escape, no possible place to withdraw or hide. The reader plummits forward holding hands with elderly Southern women, snake driving drug dealers and the small children who know the secrets that connect them. It is not a book that can be put down in the dark. I hadn't read the author's first book, but I will stampede backwards to find it. She is a genius. Her last page here is a masterful one. She can stand up with Harper Lee and Ray Bradbury in my bookcase any day.
Rating:
Summary: Boy howdy, I loved it
Review: Harriet, the 12yo protagonist, is born and bred in the tradition of Harper Lee's Scout Finch and Carson McCuller's Frankie Adams (but instead of a benevolent father or a wise housekeeper, Harriet has a tyrannical grandmother with a soft heart).
The Little Friend (insipid title that doesn't do justice to the depth of the story) is everything you could want in a book: stellar writing, nail-biting tension, hilarity, coming-of-age, atmosphere, loss of innocence, love, sorrow, and marvelous characters of all social classes without a cliche or stick figure among them.
The scene where Harriet and her cohort sneak into the upstairs of a flat where the bad guys live and find themselves literally in a next of poisonous snakes - well, those pages alone are worth the price of the book.
Superb and well worth the loooooong wait.
Rating:
Summary: Did I miss the plot resolution?
Review: Although the positive reviews about this book are correct in regards to this author's ability to tell a story, you should not underestimate the need of a reader to find resolution to a story. You will read this book and get all wrapped up in the characters...but at the end you will throw the book down in disgust. Not only will you NEVER find out who killed little Robin, you don't find out the resolution to a SINGLE plot point in the story. Everything is up in the air. I could not help wishing that the author had cut out a bit of the rambling dream stories and provided instead an actual ending to the story. I wish I had never read this book as I find myself often wondering if there is something about the story I just missed. Did the author give us a hit and I just missed it? Sadly no. This book is simply a beginning and a middle....no end in sight.
Rating:
Summary: Brave and brilliant
Review: Long chapters, long book, lots of unresolved threads -- how brave, how brilliant of Knopf and Tartt to dare to offer this story. Tartt is among the best contemporary writers I have read. I can't believe I have missed The Secret History and can't wait to read it. I don't care what the story is -- the woman doesn't simply write, she composes. The way she puts words together reaches deep inside of me -- like listening to a Beethoven symphony. I too, am baffled by all of the negative reviews.
Rating:
Summary: Loved it!
Review: It's been a long time since a novel has kept me up at night reading. This is a great read, guaranteed to take your mind off your daily woes for a few hours. Believable characters and a twisty plot makes it work. Quite an ending!
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