This is the third time that I have read Silas Marner, and it remains for me an old favourite, and it was like revisiting an old friend whom I hadn't seen for some time, but with whom everything was just as it had always been. I read the first two thirds of the book on my ipod touch via the ibooks app. I had wanted to see what I thought of reading in this way before dismissing it out of hand. It is useful to always have a book with me - and so I have added a couple more free books to my ipod touch. Actually reading on a device however - I don't much care for. I read the final third today using a real book - blowing the dust off my ancient battered little copy I seem to have always owned somehow.

Back to Silas Marner: What I love about this story is the beautiful simplicity of it. Working people in a rural idyl - so much like my adored Hardy - transgressions and repentance. All this within a wonderfully poignant story of a lonely man suffering an injustice, who becomes the unlikely guardian for a little orphaned child. A real joy to read.