Middlemarch
Ugh. Okay. It may be unfair of me to "review" this book, since I didn't make it very far. But I've talked about other books I've abandoned, so I'm talking about this one, too. Middlemarch is one of those beloved classics that everyone is supposed to have read. It's a staple of literature, telling the story of a small, English town in the early 1800s. A sprawling tale, encompassing a wealth of people and years. And it is so goddamned boring. I couldn't bring myself to care about any of these characters. Whether that's because there were too many, meaning that as soon as I might care about someone they disappeared, or whether they were actually just caricatures (the prissy maiden, the uptight doctor, the foolish eldest son), or whether I just couldn't penetrate the language I have no idea. I would read a page or two, realize I hadn't absorbed any of it, and just not care to try and re-read it. What it comes down to is that I was bo...