I can see how this book is so divisive. How some people might read it and think it's a flaming pile of pretentious garbage, and others can perhaps laud it as one of the finest pieces of literature to come out of the last few decades. I think I fall into the latter camp, though perhaps not as passionately, though I will say in the simplest terms that I loved this book. Something about it really spoke to me and effectively transported me away from my desk to the snowy recluse of Hampton, Vermont.
With underlying hints of The Great Gatsby, this epic campus novel explores the lives of five students at an elite college and their selective, cult-like Greek class where they're celebrated for being so intellectual. This whole book takes inspiration from other characters in popular literature. Richard is Nick Carraway: he's transported into a world of decadence of thought and sin, but with it comes great melancholy and personal sacrifice. He's a fish out of water in a world that's existed in plain sight for all of his schooling, the California enigma in a sea of high-brow East Coasters.
Henry is a hybrid of Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty; astoundingly clever, sharp as a knife blade, but willing to make the awful decisions because he can see past plain emotion. Tartt makes a quote about Henry resembling Holmes on the edge of the Reichenbach Falls, and it's one that's stuck with me since I finished reading. It's a masterclass in writing flawed, complex characters.

This novel is utterly brilliant. The Greek/Classical references can sometimes stunt the ease of reading, but once you get into the book, you get completely sucked in. I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I finished it. It's not one I can recommend because it's a real Marmite book, but I at least suggest that you give it a try.