She was a masterpiece of composure nothing ever ruffled her or made her upset, and though she was not beautiful her calmness had the magnetic pull of beauty-a stillness so powerful that the molecules realigned themselves around her when she came into a room. Barbour was from a society family with an old Dutch name, so cool and blonde and monotone that sometimes she seemed partially drained of blood. Barbour, the matriarch of the family who takes Theo in for a time after his mother dies, Tartt writes: Tartt offers details, more details, and more details yet while completely ignoring things like explaining the museum bombing that is a catalyst for most of the novel’s intrigue. Even rain is rendered excessively, as “raindrops dancing and prickling on the sidewalks, a smashing rain that seemed to amplify all the noise on the streets.” Throughout, the description is baroquely ornate.
Tartt’s prose offers up exacting details of how Theo Decker sees the world as a child, as a teenager, and as a young man haunted by the trauma of his past. The Goldfinch is one of those books where the writer is so passionately absorbed in her words she forgets about the reader. I couldn’t help but think of the judge who recently sentenced a woman to reading Malcolm Gladwell.
As I read The Goldfinch I found myself admiring her talent as much as I loathed the experience of reading this novel. Known connections to this year’s contenders: “I profiled Philipp Meyer for The Aesthete and reviewed Long Division for the Nation.”ĭonna Tartt is, undoubtedly, a brilliant writer. Roxane Gay is the author of two forthcoming books: An Untamed State and Bad Feminist.