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aclassicalmess's reviews
133 reviews
The Parthenon by Mary Beard
informative
slow-paced
3.5
Very glad I picked this up in a bookstore in Athens after having visited and been impressed by the architectural marvel that is the Parthenon. Can’t wait for my next visit and tell whoever I’m with random facts such as the fact that the Venetians shot 700 cannonballs at it.
No Longer Human by Osamu Dazai
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
This woman did not say “I feel so unhappy” in so many words, but something like a silent current of misery an inch wide flowed over the surface of her body. When I lay next to her my body was enveloped in her own, which mingled with my own harsher current of gloom like a “withered leaf settling to rest on the stones at the bottom of a pool.”
The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Latterly he had seen only life, felt only the great passionate person pulse of existence, unwarped, uncontorted, untrammeled by those creeds which futilely attempt to check what wisdom would be content to regulate.
Atonement by Ian McEwan
emotional
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
It wasn’t only wickedness and scheming that made people unhappy, it was confusion and misunderstanding; above all it was the failure to grasp the simple truth that other people are as real as you.
Matilda by Mary Shelley
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
The mutual link of our destinies is broken; we must be divided by seas - by land. The stars and the sun must not rise at the same period to us: he must not say, looking at the crescent of the setting moon, ‘Matilda now watches it fall.’ - No, all must be changed. Be it light with him when it is darkness with me! Let him feel the sun of summer while I am chilled by the snows of winter! Let there be the distance of the antipodes between us!
Poirot Investigates: A Hercule Poirot Mystery by Agatha Christie
Did not finish book. Stopped at 25%.
Did not finish book. Stopped at 25%.
Detective short stories just aren’t for me, I’m not gonna force myself to read this cause I doubt it’s worth it
White Nights by Fyodor Dostoevsky
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I have long been searching for someone, and that is a sign that I was looking precisely for you and that we were fated to meet now - now in my head thousands of valves have opened and I must set loose this river of words, or I will choke to death.
Battle Royale: Remastered by Koushun Takami
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Orlando by Virginia Woolf
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
He was describing as all poets are ever describing, nature, and in order to match the shade of green precisely he looked (and with more audacity than most) at the thing itself, which happened to be a laurel bush growing beneath the window. After that, of course, he could write no more. Green in nature is one thing, green in literature another. Nature and letters seem to have a natural antipathy; bring them together and they tear each other to pieces. The shade of green Orlando now saw spoilt his rhyme and split his metre.