Quote:
Originally Posted by drofgnal
Yea, it does slow you down, but the effort for some books is worth it. One I couldn't finish was Les Miserables. It's longer than War and Peace. There was one chapter devoted entirely to the battle of Waterloo. It was 75 pages long in hardback with miniscule text. The only relation to the story was a couple who were robbing corpses of money, jewlery etc in the aftermath of the battle. It would turn out to be Cossete's adopted family that Jan Valjan rescued her from. I said I had enough and put it down. Someday, maybe I'll try again.
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I finally read
Les Miserables a few months ago b/c I'd always wanted to. My less than thrilling reaction to Hugo's other most famous book
The Hunchback of Notre Dame should have forewarned me. I finished the entire, unabridged book, just so I could say I'd done it (and b/c I wondered what all the hype was from all the people who raved over the musical). The long, boring acct of Waterloo was on the first of MANY such side trips, none of which need to be in the book. An especially memorable one is the 100 pages detailing the history of the Parisian sewer system, when the only thing you need to know is that Valjean walked through the sewers to escape. I'd begun the book as an audiobook but quickly switched to e-book so I could at least skim those sections and know where to start focusing again. This is the only book I've ever read that I can totally and wholeheartedly recommend reading an abridged version!
