The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

During a shocking incident, a boy loses his mother. He keeps with him the thing that will always remind him of her: a small painting of a goldfinch.

The boy goes to live with a family who were friends to his own, but they are a painful reminder that he has no close family anymore. His father has built himself a new life and he doesn't really belong there either. So he grows up finding his own way through life, not always making the right choices, but it is the thing he values most that causes the most danger - the Goldfinch.

This is a huge book at over eight hundred pages and sometimes it feels much longer. The days of the young boy's life at times repeat the same actions over and over, signifying his aimless and disjointed life. It is written in the first person retrospectively. The writing is intricate and highly detailed, often overly so, but there is no denying the quality and depth of emotion the detail brings to the story. 

A book about loss and belonging, being an outsider, friendship and betrayal, as well as an appreciation of the finer things in life, such as art. A great bit of storytelling.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
Winner of the Andrew Carnegie Award for Excellence in Fiction
Winner of the Amazon Book of the Year
Winner of the Audie Award for Literary Fiction

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Published by Little, Brown Book Group on 22 October 2013.