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Marcelle

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Marcelle’s Bookshelves

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Marcelle is Currently Reading

Marcelle is currently reading

The Secret History

by Donna Tartt

bookshelves: favourites, general-fiction, currently-reading

Reading for the 7th time

read in July 2017

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Marcelle said: " Edit, August 2025: As Richard puts it, [a] sudden wind rustled through the birches; a gust of yellow leaves came storming down. I took a sip of my drink. If I had grown up in that house I couldn’t have loved it more, couldn’t have been more familiar Edit, August 2025: As Richard puts it, [a] sudden wind rustled through the birches; a gust of yellow leaves came storming down. I took a sip of my drink. If I had grown up in that house I couldn’t have loved it more, couldn’t have been more familiar with the creak of the swing, or the pattern of the clematis vines on the trellis, or the velvety swell of land as it faded to gray on the horizon, and the strip of highway visible—just barely—in the hills, beyond the trees. The very colors of the place had seeped into my blood: just as Hampden, in subsequent years, would always present itself immediately to my imagination in a confused whirl of white and green and red, so the country house first appeared as a glorious blur of watercolors, of ivory and lapis blue, chestnut and burnt orange and gold, separating only gradually into the boundaries of remembered objects: the house, the sky, the maple trees. But even that day, there on the porch, with Charles beside me and the smell of wood smoke in the air, it had the quality of a memory; there it was, before my eyes, and yet too beautiful to believe." And this is how I feel about this book as well, patiently anticipating its reread every year + feeling forever connected to these characters and their foolish mistakes.

Edit, August 2024: i am officially older than richard, the twins and francis... screaming crying throwing up.
also, we never talk about how goddamn funny this book is. tumblrinas are reblogging b&w photos and devastating poetry, but the scenes at the corcorans' house? francis' silk scarf? henry gatekeeping homer? i still laugh and i've read this a book a million times.

Edit, July 2023: rereading tsh once a year means holding my breath throughout the whole year until the few precious days during which I get to re-immerse myself in the world of Hampden<3
The takeaway this time was that I have come to loathe Henry (my initial favorite!) and that I'm entirely unconvinced that Charles was as bad as they made him out to be. Excited for the 2024 reread:)

Edit, July 2022: i love you morbid longing for the picturesque at all costs i love you layers of silence upon silence i love you empty soda cans used as ashtrays i love you cubitum eamus i love you champagne in a teapot i love you asparagus i love you judy poovey i love you metahemeralism i love you bramble roses i love you hampden college forever

Edit, August 2021: The first time you read The Secret History, you are like Richard at nineteen; bewitched by your surroundings, with an eerie sense that something just beyond your grasp is very wrong, but nevertheless willing to cast the feeling aside. The second time, you are like Richard at twenty eight; now able to decipher that everything was doomed from the very beginning and having no choice but to gasp at how it all, terrifyingly and inevitably, falls into place, as what was once foggy and slightly off-putting turns into a crystal-clear and shattering reality.

Original review, 2017: I'm not even sure I can describe in words how much I adored this book. Seductive and disturbing, written with an unmatched style and introducing an unforgettable cast of characters, it is definitely my favorite read of the year. ...more "

progress:

(page 38 of 629)
"have been looking forward to my annual reread:)" — Aug 27, 2026 01:15PM

Aug 29, 2025 02:27PM · see review

Marcelle is currently reading

Ο νεοφεουδαρχικός συνταγματισμός

by Κωνσταντίνος Θ. Γιαννακόπουλος

bookshelves: currently-reading, non-fiction

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Aug 27, 2026 01:13PM

Marcelle’s Quotes

“The story so far:
In the beginning the Universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.”
― Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

tags: fantasy, humor, scifi

23529 likes

“You have to write the book that wants to be written. And if the book will be too difficult for grown-ups, then you write it for children.”
― Madeleine L'Engle

tags: books, children, difficult, grown-ups, write, writers, writing

16960 likes

“All God does is watch us and kill us when we get boring. We must never, ever be boring.”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Invisible Monsters

tags: god, humor, life

11630 likes

“I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring

tags: family, friends, parties, social

12526 likes