#Friday56 & #BookBeginnings: The Goldfinch


When I was still in Amsterdam, I dreamed about my mother for the first time in years. I'd been shut up in my hotel for more than a week, afraid to telephone anybody or go out; and my heart scrambled and floundered at even the most innocent noises: elevator bell, rattle of the minibar cart, even church clocks tolling the hour. de Westertoren, Krijtberg, a dark edge to the clangor, an in-wrought fairy-tale sense of doom.
- p. 5

For Friday 56:
Though I didn't understand why he was so unhappy, it was clear to me that his unhappiness was our fault.- p. 56



About The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt*: It begins with a boy. Theo Decker, a thirteen-year-old New Yorker, miraculously survives an accident that kills his mother. Abandoned by his father, Theo is taken in by the family of a wealthy friend. Bewildered by his strange new home on Park Avenue, disturbed by schoolmates who don't know how to talk to him, and tormented above all by his unbearable longing for his mother, he clings to one thing that reminds him of her: a small, mysteriously captivating painting that ultimately draws Theo into the underworld of art.

As an adult, Theo moves silkily between the drawing rooms of the rich and the dusty labyrinth of an antiques store where he works. He is alienated and in love-and at the center of a narrowing, ever more dangerous circle.

The Goldfinch combines vivid characters, mesmerizing language, and suspense, while plumbing with a philosopher's calm the deepest mysteries of love, identity, and art. It is an old-fashioned story of loss and obsession, survival and self-invention, and the ruthless machinations of fate.



***
Ever since I read The Secret History, I knew that I was bound to pick up another book by Donna Tartt. Yeah, I am seriously late on the bandwagon for this one.

But you know how you know that it's just going to be a good read? I have that feeling about this one. Soon ... I'm wrapping by Barkskins by Annie Proulx and lining up my holiday reading. This one is in the pile!

P.S. To those who regularly visit, sorry for the two-week Friday silence. I'm back, if that's any consolation!

Have you read this? What did you think?



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© guiltless readingMaira Gall