War and Peace

I try not to blog twice in the same day, and I've been saving my War and Peace blog until I finished the book. But something just happened that made me not be able to put it off any longer.

I admit, War and Peace is a hard read. Not impossible. But hard. I'm at page 857, and I've been reading it on and off for about 2 months. What happens is that I get to the war parts, get disinterested, and don't pick it up again for a week. I don't like reading about the war maneuvers. It also takes slightly longer, because I read the French parts in French first, to see what I think they say, then I go read the English translation to see how close I was. There are parts where half of every page is in French, so this adds to the time its taking to read it.

I've been reading this book comparing it to Anna Karenina, because that's the only other Tolstoy I've read. So far I don't know which book I like more. I love Anna Karenina, only because of Levin. I find Anna annoying, and don't think for one second that Vronsky was worth throwing her life away for. Do I think that she should have had to give up her friends and son for Vronsky because government and society said so? No. But even still, he wasn't worth it. But Levin. And Kitty. You love them both, with all of their faults.

In War and Peace you get Pierre, Natasha, Prince Andrei, Sonia, and many many many more. You love Pierre, despite his stupidity. You like Natasha, despite the fact that she's entirely self centered and doesn't always deserve what she gets. You like Bolkonsky (Prince Andrei) despite his moral superiority and you want the best for Sonia, because she's the harmless person who takes care of everyone else.

Anyway, I just got to something that made me hug the book. Yes, I hug books. When they make me especially happy, or something is really really funny, I just take a second and hug the book. All of my favorite books have that "hug it its so good" moment. So now War and Peace got added to the list.