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Les Misérables

Victor Hugo

Discussion: . Week 1: More Than 500 Pages

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. Week 1: More Than 500 Pages

* Week 1: Introduction
By Jessica · 102 posts · 1093 views

last updated Aug 11, 2015 02:06PM

* Week 1: Progress Post
By Jessica · 100 posts · 421 views

last updated Nov 06, 2015 06:29AM

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Apr 11, 2012 Adam Smith rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: my-ebooks, classics, reading-challenge-2015

After serving many years as a convict because he stole a loaf of bread, Jean Valjean has finally been released. The world is cruel to an ex-convict and it is not long before he slips back into his old thieving ways, it is only when a kindly old bishop shows him a sliver of kindness that he starts believing that he can turn his life around. Unfortunately it is already too late, Jean Valjean has broken the law and faces life in the galleys if he is caught again. Trying his best to be a good man, h After serving many years as a convict because he stole a loaf of bread, Jean Valjean has finally been released. The world is cruel to an ex-convict and it is not long before he slips back into his old thieving ways, it is only when a kindly old bishop shows him a sliver of kindness that he starts believing that he can turn his life around. Unfortunately it is already too late, Jean Valjean has broken the law and faces life in the galleys if he is caught again. Trying his best to be a good man, he goes into hiding and devotes his life to charity, but the threat of imprisonment looms hanging over his head as an over zealous lawman continues hunting him relentlessly. This is the story of the life of Jean Valjean.

Ugh.

Four year. It took me four freaking years to finish this book. I was sick of it by 4% but I refused to let it beat me. There is a good story buried in here, a really good story, but it is so mired down in pointless side notes and radical shifts in tone that there isn't really much of a point. Any time I started to get pulled into the action, the author would go off on another lengthy tangent describing what kind of chair was at the table a hundred years before the action takes place. It happened like clockwork, just when I was starting to enjoy it the entire thing gets derailed for another hundred pages. Almost like the author was doing it just to annoy me.

Cultural values must have shifted a lot since this was written. A lot of the drama could have been avoided had the characters actually had the brains enough to stop and think. A large section towards the end would have been instantly resolved if everyone wasn't been so thick about it. Then again there must have been a lot that seems obvious now that must have been a complete mystery back then considering there is a pivotal scene that revolves around one of the characters failing to understand how a mirror works.

A long book is a considerable investment. Maybe if I hadn't found the writing so grating I would have enjoyed this more. As it was the only way I found to get through all this was to read it one percent at a time. I have close to a hundred status updates on this book thanks to this method and I honestly stopped caring around twenty pages in. I hated Maurice, his sections dragged on too long and his entire character arc only served to annoy me. I do not give a fig about French history either. I lost track of the very many revolutions they kept having and the level of reaching that was involved in some of these lessons were really pushing it.

This book is a monster. I slayed it and will never willingly go near it again. If only they has skipped over the pointless filler and actually focused on the main story, I might have liked it. I also did not appreciate the random lines of French that were left untranslated until the footnotes at the very end. I am not going to trudge back and forth because some brainless editor had their head up their own ass. I'm sure the original French had a poignancy that was deemed important enough to leave as is, but it was just plain irritating. Especially when the rest of the scene revolves around that sentence.

I started reading this because I had heard good things, but I finished it out of spite. I refused to give in, I'm just that stubborn. For whatever it is worth, there were some parts that I did enjoy but overall it was just tedious. Not worth the effort, but I can see how others would enjoy it.

Not recommended unless you are willing to slog through one of the longest books there is.

***Reading Challenge 2015: A book you started but never finished*** ...more

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