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Jan 11, 2015gendeg rated this title 1.5 out of 5 stars
Abandon ship! Abandon ship! Sorry, I couldn't take it anymore, the narrator droning on and on in that preternaturally precocious tone of hers. Over-wrought writing. Pessl's narrator makes constant writing-clogging literary and cultural references. It's just the epitome of literary writing gone bad. It strains, it over-preens. I agree with one reviewer who said: "The laborious process of reading this book felt like 514 pages of a precocious child shrieking, 'Aren't I clever?' into my face, only they were pronouncing clever incorrectly because they were not, in fact, very bright, and also projecting spittle into my face every single time." Except, kudos to that reviewer for finishing. I made it only half way. There are some riveting sections here and there, and the premise is great. So many other readers found this novel brilliant and were enamored with the writing style. BUT...I just couldn't move past the main character without entertaining homicidal thoughts. Yeah, it was that bad for me. For a good, brainy mystery steeped in academia and the antics of blue bloods-behaving-badly, stick with Donna Tartt's The Secret History.