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1-Page Summary of The Goldfinch

Overall Summary

Donna Tartt’s book, The Goldfinch, was a national best seller and won the Pulitzer Prize in 2014. It follows the life of Theo Decker from his early teens into his late twenties. The story begins when he is hiding out in a hotel room as an adult and moves back to his childhood before circling back to adulthood.

Theo lives with his mother, Audrey, in New York City. Theo’s father, Larry, has recently left the family and moved to Las Vegas. One day at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MOMA), Theo and Audrey are on their way to a meeting regarding Theo’s misbehavior at school. In an exhibit about Dutch Masters paintings, Audrey shows Theo a painting by Carel Fabritius called The Goldfinch. Later that day while visiting MOMA with his mom again and looking for her after she walks away from him for a minute or two in another part of the museum where there is another exhibit going on he sees Pippa who is talking to Welty who gives him instructions about taking care of The Goldfinch which happens to be a painting they are standing right next to when suddenly an explosion goes off killing both Audrey and Welty but not before Welty instructs Theo take The Goldfinch along with some other things such as a ring belonging to someone named Hobart & Blackwell which will help them find out what happened later on down the road after everything settles down.

Theo takes the painting and returns home. Social workers inform him of Audrey’s death, and he moves in with a wealthy family on Park Avenue whose son is his friend. He keeps the painting hidden for several months. He goes to Hobart & Blackwell, where he meets Welty’s partner Hobie. He also visits Pippa, who suffered brain damage from a bomb blast at their shop. Theo continues going to school and learns how to restore antique furniture with help from Hobie.

Theo’s father, Larry, arrives from Las Vegas with his girlfriend, Xandra. They take Theo to live with them and they frequently abuse drugs. Theo becomes close friends with another teenager named Boris who takes him around New York City and the two spend all of their time together watching movies, stealing stuff and drinking alcohol. One day while high on drugs Theo shows Boris a painting that he stole from the museum called The Goldfinch which is worth millions of dollars but when he wakes up in the morning it has been replaced by a textbook inside complex wrappings. He doesn’t notice this until years later when he finally gets questioned about it by police.

Larry dies in a car accident, and Theo returns to New York on his own to avoid social services. He takes Xandra’s dog, Popper, and what he believes is The Goldfinch. He shows up at Hobart & Blackwell with the items and Hobie agrees to take him in.

By the time he is in his early twenties, Theo has taken over Hobart and Blackwell with Hobie’s help. Theo had to resort to illegal practices like selling fake pieces as genuine objects to pay off their debt. One of his clients threatened to expose him for this practice and also revealed that he knows about The Goldfinch theft.

Boris shows up in New York and reveals that he stole The Goldfinch. He used the painting as collateral for his illegal dealings, which made him wealthy. Boris wants to make it up to Theo by getting the painting back from Amsterdam where one of his colleagues has stolen it. They hatch a plan to get the painting back, but hitmen take it away during a shooting match in which Boris kills one man and Theo kills another.

The novel circles back to Theo hiding out in his hotel room after the shooting. He doesn’t know what to do, so he waits a week for Boris to find him and give him money as a reward for returning The Goldfinch. Theo goes back to New York and tells Hobie everything that happened at the museum. They spend the next year buying all of their fake pieces back from buyers who were unaware they were fakes.