Title: The Count of Monte Cristo
Author: Alexandre Dumas
Pages: 1472
Finished: November 17, 2018
First Sentence: On the 24th of February, 1815, the look-out at Notre-Dame de la Garde signalled the three-master, the Pharaon from Smyrna, Trieste, and Naples.
Summary: Edmond Dantes comes home from his most recent voyage very triumphant. He's about to be made captain. He has a fantastic girlfriend who he decides to marry. He can provide for his ailing father. Unfortuantely, Edmond also has enemies - men who want that which he has. They hatch a plot to get Edmond out of their way, a plot that only moves forward when the cowardly procurer du roi decides it's for the best if Edmond is incarcerated in order to keep suspicions form the procurer du roi's own family. This is the story of how Edmond fell, and how he because the Count of Monte Cristo, hell bent on revenge for losing everything.
Thoughts: Oh my god! I finally finished it. I started this book in January and am finally done. Lesson to self: I read better by reading for longer stretches and then taking a break rather than reading a chapter a day.
One of the things that I found interesting about this book... when people found out I was reading this, they would fawn over the book. It's the best book they ever read. They LOVE the Count of Monte Cristo. It's so amazing...
I was underwhelmed.
AFTER HERE THERE BE SPOILERS!!!
First, let me say, this is the type of book you need to read with a pen and notebook. You need to note who's who. This is very important because if you don't, suddenly you get really angry at a 200 page diversion to Italy with a young man named Morcerf who doesn't mean anything to you... until you realize you totally missed the name 300 pages back when it was mentioned in passing by someone else. Seriously? I totally missed that Fernand and Mercedes became the Morcerfs. Had I caught that, I would have enjoyed the whole Italy bit so much more.
I found myself very... frustrated. I'm not one for revenge which is basically this entire tale. Yes the Count planned everything to the tiniest detail. Yes it was meticulous. No, that doesn't make me like the book. Even with the stuff that has happened in my life that I'm not going to go into on an anonymous blog... I've felt a lot of anger, and then I just wanted to heal and move on with my life.
And maybe that's where this is falling flat for me. I felt so sorry for Edmond when he was sent to jail. I felt so sorry for Edmond when he got out of jail and discovered what happened. But then, he was rich and he had the world at his fingertips. I felt sorry for him that he never healed. It wasn't until Madame Villefort and her son died that he finally felt he'd taken things too far.
I was also really frustrated that he and Mercedes never got together. I mean, I get it, but it felt like such a rip off to me, that he went through all this effort only to not get with the girl. I suppose he gets with A girl... but it's not the one I was rooting for.
Most of all, the book is just LONG. I don't mind long books when I find them interesting. But I just didn't find this one interesting. None of the characters were all that likable. There were a lot of chapters that just didn't make sense until they did... but it was such a long time for them to make sense that I just felt an overall feeling of annoyance. By the end, I did want to see how everything would play out, but I didn't really enjoy it. Probably the story I was most engrossed in was Eugenie Debray and her music instructor/possible lover. The Romeo and Juliet story of Morrell and Valentine was insipid. The mystery of the poisoner was... really dull actually. The audience knew who it was from 600 pages ago, but watching everyone else bumble around didn't do anything for me.
I'm glad I read it. I have a better idea of certain allusions etc. But in general, this is not my favorite book.
Read for Back to the Classics: A Book That Scares You AND The Classics Club.
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