Don Quixote

This book has definitely set some new records for me. I started reading Don Quixote in my enthusiasm for this new goal of reading through Rory's books.  That was April of 2015. Now we are in March of 2016 and I just finished it.

It had been a book that I was interested in, and had actually purchased from Barnes and Noble from a previous "I'm going to read classics" stage. But this book is intense. My copy has 891 pages, with little words.

Added to my trouble with this book is that unlike modern novels, for most of it there wasn't a huge draw to the story. It really had nothing hooking that made me desperate to read it, but was comprised of lots of little vignettes, sometimes funny, usually interesting, but not too connected to other parts.

For my own sanity, it wasn't the only book I was reading. I read a bunch of other books throughout the course of the year, but continued to force myself to keep putting some time into this super classic, determined to finish it.

As 2016 rolled around, and I still wasn't done, I decided to make a final push to get this book finished. I have never even come close to taking a year to read a book, even thousand page books, and I wasn't about to not finish this one in a year. So, I downloaded the audiobook, and started listening to it.

Not only did it really help it get read while I did dishes, folded laundry or drove somewhere (without the kids in the car, I don't think they could handle this book), but it helped me understand it better, and gave an amazing voice and depth to the characters which I hadn't picked up on my own. 

The funny thing is that once I finished, I decided it deserved four out of five stars. Sure, it isn't hooking, but there were a lot of great things about it.

The friendship of the two main characters is genuine, and is proven time and again through the rough trials they go through together. When Quixote isn't being crazy, he has really good advice and wisdom, which I literally wrote down to remember later- it was that good.

My favorite is, "Always remember who you are, and endeavor to know yourself... pride yourself on performing worthy actions."

Even though he does ridiculous dumb things, when people started to give him flak for it, he immediately can go into "wisdom mode" and talk about how his illusions only lead him to try to travel the world searching for good to do, and how that isn't a bad thing.

There were scenes that had me cracking up laughing, which is really impressive considering that it is a book hundreds of years old, not the modern humor at all.

As hard as it was to get through, as long as it took me to get through, it is hard for me to say that everyone should read this book. But at the same time, I can say that I am glad that I read it. It might not be as high as a "go read this book" but it definitely wasn't a dislike either.

For the record, I do think it is worth noting that listening to the Yale (go Rory) lectures on itunes U really helped me understand the backstory more, and caught things that I missed just reading through.

A Tale of Two Cities

Is it heretical to rate a Dickens book anything less than a 5? Sadly, as much as I eventually enjoyed the story, I found it to be very wordy, slow at times, and confusing at times. But overall I liked the character development and found the last third of the book to be exciting and fully interesting. Worth a read, not just for historical/ cultural value.

That is what I wrote on goodreads, and I think it does a good job of summarizing my thoughts about the book. Overall, I decided it was worth a 4.

When I told my husband I had never read A Tale of Two Cities he was surprised. It is that much of a classic, one that everyone has heard of, and one that is expected to be in the vernacular of a well read person. Yet, it was never one of my assigned high school books, and I think that most classics are in danger of never being unless they are forced reading. You don't usually tell your friends to read a classic like you do Hunger Games, you aren't typically going to read it either before or after a big blockbuster film, because if they are going to be made into movies, most of them already have been.

Yet, I was completely in the dark about this book, except for the first line, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." I didn't even know that it was about the French Revolution, until we got to that point in the book! Even the blurb on the back cover, which I read about halfway through the book, was a spoiler for me.

I started listening to it as an audiobook on itunesU, which is a great app by the way, in that there are many classics available to listen to for free, as well as lectures about a diverse and large number of topics. For the first portion of the book, I was content to listen to it slowly, and whenever I happened to have a good time to listen. Then it got more exciting, and I started listening to it more at home, purposely seeking out times to listen. Then it got to a point where listening wasn't good enough (which frequently happens to me with audiobooks) and I happened to own the book (thanks to my husband's high school book collection), so I learned the conclusion of the book partly by reading and partly by listening.

As I said in my short review, I did come to enjoy the characters, and especially how they were shaped and changed over the course of the book. But no matter how much I got drawn into the story, no matter how much I found myself enjoying the characters, I couldn't rate it a five.

There were complete paragraphs that I would have edited out, and as much as Dickens is a renowned author, I felt that he was confusing at times. Even as someone who loves to read, and went up to AP English in high school, I found myself having to go online to have portions of the story explained to me.

Overall, I would say, prepare yourself for confusion, and excessively wordy paragraphs, but also for an adventure of a story (once the revolution starts), and joining the large portion of the population who have already read this famous story.