by Donna Tartt
First published 2013
Thirteen-year-old Theo Decker survives a terrorist bombing at an art museum—an explosion that kills his mother. In the chaos, he impulsively steals a priceless Dutch painting, "The Goldfinch," becoming an accidental art thief with a secret that will define his life. Shuttled between the wealthy Manhattan home of a school friend, the seedy Las Vegas suburbs with his alcoholic father, and the antique shop of a kind mentor, Theo carries his stolen artwork and his grief like twin weights. As he grows older, the painting becomes both his most precious possession and a dangerous liability, pulling him into criminal networks and forcing him to navigate increasingly treacherous moral terrain. His survival depends on keeping one impossible secret and finding connection in a world that has already taken everything from him.
Genres: fiction, literary-fiction, mystery, contemporary
Vibes: atmospheric, dark, emotional, suspenseful
Tropes: accidental-hero, found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Las Vegas, Manhattan, New York
Period: 21st-century
771 pages · Hardcover · Little, Brown
Content warnings: death