Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

At my favorite Palm Springs used bookstore this summer, I spent almost all the cash I had on a paperback copy of Anna Karenina. I spent the summer studying for my exams, and figured that this would be the perfect time to read a classic Russian novel I'd had on my list for ages. However, it surprised me by being good. This is what I wrote last July:

So I'm reading Anna Karenina, and loving it. I don't know if it's just the Wuthering Heights Effect* or not, but I'm always excited to crack it open when I'm eating or before bed, and would certainly much prefer to read it to whatever is on the exam bibliography for the day. I did not expect to like it this much; although several of you have recommended it, I've had some experience with Tolstoy, and happen to know he's crazy. I've read other Russians, too (including Solzhenitsyn's One Day in the Life, Chekhov's Three Sisters, Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov, Gogol's Dead Souls, and Nabokov's Pale Fire and Lolita) and figured that the best way to get through a substantial (800 page!) novel like this one would be to contrast it with something I'd rather avoid, like the readings for my exams. I ended up really liking The Brothers Karamazov, but that occurred only after a painful slog through the first THREE QUARTERS OF IT. Anyway, 'turns out that Anna isn't a slog at all. I'm totally digging it.

Even after finishing all 800 pages of it, I still feel the same way. This was an excellent, absorbing story with intriguing characters and thoughtful social commentary. I'll readily admit that I didn't understand all the political machinations, but they hardly dimmed my enjoyment. The characters remain lively in their humanness, and though the details of their situations are rather different than those today, they remain relevant (although I was certainly glad for the freedoms I have now).

I would definitely recommend this, although I'd suggest making sure you have a contemporary translation (mine was the Signet Classics version pictured above).

*I read Wuthering Heights the summer I was in Florence, between sessions, when I should have been fully immersed in Italian. Instead, I sneaked chapters of Wuthering Heights, which an American friend had left behind, and I LOVED it. I haven't revisited the book, but based on others' overwhelming impressions of it, I'm thinking my enjoyment may have had primarily to do with the context of it being my guilty pleasure.

Douglas Preston & Mario Spezi, The Monster of Florence

My parents' neighbor brought this over while I was studying for my exams this summer. He thought I might be interested in the subject matter, having lived in Florence for six months. I was interested, and ended up reading the book in about three days, taking guilty little breaks from my exam studying.

Preston, who is a crime novelist, brings an unmistakable drama to this already almost improbably dramatic, but nonetheless true, story. I had never heard of the Monster of Florence (although I'd read two reviews of the book before the neighbor brought it over), and was stunned to encounter the tale. The police investigation of the crimes proves to be as riveting--and alarming--a story as the murders themselves. A very quick, very easy and entertaining, if rather macabre, read.