Middlemarch

I read Middlemarch by George Eliot for book club. The book description says, "George Eliot's most ambitious novel is a masterly evocation of diverse lives and changing fortunes in a provincial community. Peopling its landscape are Dorothea Brooke, a young idealist whose search for intellectual fulfillment leads her into a disastrous marriage to the pedantic scholar Casaubon; the charming but tactless Dr Lydgate, whose marriage to the spendthrift beauty Rosamund and pioneering medical methods threaten to undermine his career; and the religious hypocrite Bulstrode, hiding scandalous crimes from his past. As their stories interweave, George Eliot creates a richly nuanced and moving drama."

This book was probably the longest book I've ever read (30+ hours on audiobook) and one I would never have finished (or even started) if it weren't for book club. But I'm proud of myself for reading it, and I actually liked it better than I expected. Like it wasn't painful to push myself through the whole thing like I expected--rather, I was interested in how things would turn out for certain characters all the way to the end. Overall, the book had some memorable lines, some deep characters (my favorite was Dorothea), and some engaging stories. I think it'll be fun to discuss at book club. This is a book that is probably in between "it was okay" and "liked it," so I'll round up to a "liked it."

Rating: * * (2/3 = Liked it)