Dire - Rated 
Having felt not qualified to review this book after attempting to read it a year ago (and being unable to finish), I now feel compelled to warn potenital readers of how utterly appalling I found it, having stumbled acorss it on Amazon again and seen so many postitive reviews - were we even reading the same book?
I picked this off the shelf in eager anticipation last year while hunting for some holiday reads. Being a massive Donna Tartt fan, the blurb comparing the two grabbed me hook, line and sinker and the book didn't even get as far as my suitcase - that's how keen I was to start this.
After the first 100 pages I decided that life is far too short. To summarise: there is little or no plot that I could fathom, the characters were all hideous (give me someone to love or hate, but not someone who I couldn't care less about and certainly not 10 of them), the writing was way OTT even for an American teenager (Dawsons Creek eat your heart out).
I read alot of books (probably 5-6 per month, sometimes more) but I can't remember the last time something irritated me as much as this one. The blurb is misleading - in no way is this anywhere near as good as The Secret History. If you haven't already read Donna Tartt's TSH, then I implore you buy that instead. And if you get a taste for murder on an American campus then get Paulina Simon's Red Leaves. Both are a thousand times better.
Pynchon for the OC generation - Rated 
I stalled on this book three times in the first hundred pages. So overwritten is Pessl's prose that you begin to wish that it was a crime punishable by incarceration - or at least permanent deprivation of the word processor. But, motivated by the glittering reviews adorning the book's back cover and inside pages, I struggled on.
Somewhere in this contrived mess is a fairly interesting story struggling to be told, but the plot (what there is of it) crashes and burns about two thirds of the way through after a middle section where the author just gets on with telling us a story, briefly making it an enjoyable reading experience. It's not helped by paper thin characterisations which are so insipid that I didn't care a jot what happened to who and why.
Yes, I know the narrative voice is supposed to be pretentious and the constant literary references part of Blue's character, but really, so what?
Or rather, whatever.
A Great Read - Rated 
There's no accounting for taste, - I mean, 1 star - ugh! This is a great read and really rattles along towards the end. The 'pretentious' writing style (trope overkill) is deliberate (and fun, if you go with it) - as the characters have, quite literally, their own pretentions - and that's why the 'overwritten' style works - Duh! OK, you need to get past the 200 page mark and from there on in, I assure you, it gets fast and dark. You also have to work out what is going on, - I'm not so sure some people could handle that, judging by some of the reviews here.
Frustrating - Rated
I found myself flipping forward pages just to get past all the coma inducing digressions and references in the hope of finding some skeleton of a story. (P.S I didnt)Seriously has the author ever heard of editing? What a total mess!
Stick with it... it's fantastic! - Rated
Although there are already lots of reviews of this book, I just had to add my own, if only to boost the average rating which at the time of writing (3 stars) is unjustifiably low. I think the trick with this (and all??) books is to try it for its own sake, not to uncover a worthy understudy to a favourite read. It might take a little getting into, being peppered with references to various novels and films, but it's absolutely, certainly, 100% worth it. This is absorbing, original and takes some great twists and turns. It's not a conventional whodunnit, nor the usual coming-of-age tale of adolescence and high school, but it has great characters, sharp observations and a plot that's smooth, tense and crackling all at the same time.
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