[mild???? spoilers whatever]

so (and no one is more surprised than me), i loved this.

i first started this book four years ago, when i was in my first year of uni. it was absolutely cooked, i remember getting to the part where richard had his first greek class and i couldn't be bothered deciphering it, so i put it down for four years. i don't even really know why i decided to pick it up again? i never planned to, and the hype that resurged about this book around 2015 kind of died down again. this weekend i was home, though, and i'd just finished something else i can't even remember, and this was just the only thing eye-level height on my shelf that i hadn't actually read yet. and here we are. i guess i read this quickly? 600+ pages in three days is pretty fucking quick for me these days. i wish i could say it was because it grabbed me. that i couldn't put it down. but actually it just takes an eight hour bus ride for me to get from college to home and eight hours back again. turns out roughly seven hours was enough to finish it. i did love it though, and, after finishing book one, i didn't even think about putting it down for a bit of a breather.

anyway.

i know nothing about greek classics. i seriously seriously don't. i also have no particular leaning towards romanticism or aestheticism, so really on the surface this book shouldn't appeal to me? but i do have a major, major, weakness for character building. if a book gives me enough information to properly psychoanalyse a fictional character, i am there. and this book truly goes above and beyond.

it unfolds rather slowly, and yet is perfectly, precisely, paced. none of the characters are particularly likeable, which i guess is why i loved them so much. i didn't realise how much i actually did like them until they all fell apart either. they're human, however much the narrator wants to romanticise and glorify them. is that what's beautiful about the secret history? the book is truly an examination of humanity, and of morality. starring five (six) morally corrupt privileged people who happen to be good at learning ancient languages. even murderers have feelings and families and drug addictions. but i don't know.

it was truly an experience; i'm not sure i'll ever read something that captures the same experience again. the prose took a good 100 pages to adjust to, it's very wordy but not necessarily in a pretentious way, just in a way that requires a bit more focus than normal. another interesting thing i've noticed is that i didn't skip a line in this book. i'm usually prone to skipping a paragraph if it looks boring (lol) but this book made it very difficult to do so. i haven't loved reading for a while, but this book might have changed that.

anyway camilla was my fave bitch. i'll shut up now, there's your fucking review.

and yes, i have added it to my favourites shelf upon two days of reflection.