My Goodreads Review of The Goldfinch

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Terrific. Beautiful writing. Good balance of plot, theme, character-development. Always interesting to me that a female author can create such fleshed-out, believable male characters, including the protagonist.

Although some may not agree, I appreciate the indeterminateness of the ending. It wrapped up the plot--anything less would be too unsatisfying--but did not wrap up the character's lives. That works for me.

For almost the entire book, I was mystified by Theo's obsession with Pippa. But by the end of the book I think I get it. Somehow symbolic, twinned with his obsession with The Goldfinch painting, a longing for something that can never be obtained. In his case, the loss of his mother in adolescence, and with that, the chance for a normal, safe, not-self-destructive life.

The sense of place is well-done. Particularly post-great-Recession Las Vegas. I have never been there, but that is just how I imagine it.

Beautiful, lyrical writing, likely to send anyone at least occasionally to the dictionary.


View all my reviews