Donna Tartt - The Secret History

What should I tell you? About the Saturday in December that Bunny ran around the house at five in the morning, yelling "First snow!" and pouncing on our beds? Or the time Camilla tried to teach me the box step; or the time Bunny turned the boat over - with Henry and Francis in it - because he thought he saw a water snake? About Henry's birthday party, or about the two instances when Francis's mother - all red hair and alligator pumps and emeralds - turned up on her way to New York, trailing the Yorkshire terrier and the second husband? (She was a wild card, that mother of his; and Chris, her new husband, was a bit player in a soap opera, barely older than Francis. Olivia was her name. At the time I first met her, she had just been released from the Betty Ford Center after having been cured of alcoholism and an unspecified drug habit, and was launching merrily down the path of sin again. Charles once told me that she had knocked on his door in the middle of the night and asked if he would care to join her and Chris in bed. I still get cards from her at Christmas.)
One day, however, remains particularly vivid, a brilliant Saturday in October, one of the last summery days we had that year. The night before - which had been rather cold - we'd stayed up drinking and talking till almost dawn, and I woke late, hot and vaguely nauseated, to find my blankets kicked to the foot of the bed and sun pouring through the window. I lay very still for a long time. The sun filtered through my eyelids a bright, painful red, and my damp legs prickled with the heat. Beneath me, the house was silent, shimmering and oppresive.
I made my way downstairs, my feet creaking on the steps. The house was motionless, empty. Finally I found Francis and Bunny on the shady side of the porch. Bunny had on a T-shirt and a pair of Bermuda shorts; Francis, his face flushed a blotchy albino pink, and his eyelids closed and almost fluttering with pain, was wearing a ratty terry-cloth bathrobe that was stolen from a hotel.
They were drinking prairie oysters. Francis pushed his over to me without looking at it. "Here, drink this," he said. "I'll be sick if I look at it another second."
The yolk quivered, gently, in its bloody bath of ketchup and Worcestershire. "I don't want it," I said and pushed it back.
He crossed his legs and pinched the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. "I don't know why I make these things," he said. "They never work. I have to go get some Alka-Seltzer."
Charles closed the screen door behind him and wandered listlessly onto the porch in his red-striped bathrobe. "What you need," he said, "is an ice-cream float."
"You and your ice-cream floats."
"They work, I tell you. It's very scientific. Cold things are good for nausea and-"
"You're always saying that, Charles, but I just don't think it's true."
"Would you just listen to me for a second? The ice cream slows down your digestion. The Coke settles your stomach and the caffeine cures your headache. Sugar gives you energy. And besides, it makes you metabolize the alcohol faster. It's the perfect food."
"Go make me one, would you?" said Bunny.
"Go make it yourself," said Charles, suddenly irritable.
"Really," Francis said, "I think I just need an Alka-Seltzer."
Henry - who had been up, and dressed, since the first wink of dawn - came down shortly, followed by a sleepy Camilla, damp and flushed from her bath, and her gold chrystanthemum of a head curled and chaotic. It was almost two in the afternoon. The greyhound lay on its side, drowsing, one chestnut-colored eye only partly closed and rolling grotesquely in the socket.

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Ukázek mnoho, sepisování se nedaří. Ale - čtu jako dráha, tyhle dny, a ne nedbale, pořádně a důkladně, dokonce místy porušuju svoje pravidlo o nevpisování do knih. Vpisuju taky do deníku, z čehož mám ohromnou radost, je to zčásti taky tím, že se dějou věci.
Secret History mě donutila ulejvat se z práce. Nejsem si, ani po týdnu po dočtení, docela jistá proč, ale kombinace prostředí (college ve Vermontu, nejspíš hraje na moji náklonnost k Nové Anglii a jejímu podzimu a zimě), detektivní zápletky a příběhu bohatého na vrstvy a linie mě přilepila k textu silou, kterou jsem nedokázala překonat. Tempo v závěru knihy trochu zvolní a pak už člověk semtam uvidí i nedokonalost, ale pro ten zážitek předtím to musíte zkusit. Pro ty, kdo přečetli STOCP, tohle je lepší (a prvních 100 stran mi připadalo, že to Marisha Pessl kompletně vykradla, pak se naštěstí knihy od sebe vzdálí..). Ukázka se mi vybírala neuvěřitelně těžko, chtěla jsem totiž, aby v ní byl kousek dialogu, ale pak zase chyběl kontext, snad se to povedlo aspoň trochu.
Jedna špatná zpráva na závěr, pokud vím, do češtiny přeložená není (honem mě někdo opravte!).