Adventures in Reading: "Anna Karenina" by Leo Tolstoy

"Anna Karenina". It could also be called "Perseverance".

That was a long, sometimes tedious book. I don't have much to say about it, despite the fact that it was close to one thousand pages long.

Essentially, it is a book about the way a handful of Russian aristocrats deal with the changing times on of the 18th century. It also compares rural and societal life, and has major overarching themes of religion and morality. And while the writing itself is very good, the story seemed to drag for me. I couldn't wait for the climax, to see how everything tied together...but I was left pretty unsatisfied. The pay-off wasn't big enough compared to all the reading I had to do.

And I found the character of Anna Karenina herself to become less and less sympathetic as the story continued. I found myself getting more and more annoyed with her. I've heard that Tolstoy was enamored with her character. Can't imagine why, unless he loved pathetic women...

Anyway...I did it. I read the whole thing, and I did enjoy a lot about it. The description and writing style are first-rate, and the characters do really come alive, otherwise I wouldn't dislike some of them so much! But I'm very happy to be done with it, especially since I've been collecting books to read when I was finally done. I have a big beautiful stack just waiting for me. Very exciting :)

PS: The best part about reading this book was losing it at a bar on my birthday. Definitely made for a good story!