This classic turns out to be the least Dostoyevskian of the Dostoevsky novels I've read so far, at least in format. There's an unusually large number of supporting characters (I had to keep re-checking the character list until the end), excessively long narrative scenes and the psychology of his most complex characters is murkier than his other major works. He apparently wrote this as a serial during a period when his daughter died and he was in dire financial straits, so I imagine that has something to do with the stylistic deviations.

But The Idiot is a Dostoevsky joint all the same - a tragedy about human suffering in a wicked world. The protagonist is a Christ-like epileptic, Prince Myshkin, who despite being a good man cannot help being manipulated by destructive and ignorant figures of society into choices that create misfortune for himself and the people around him. There's much to think on here and I wager that any reader who can get over the idiosyncratic qualities of the story will find the same.