Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This classic tells the story of Bathsheba Everdene, a young farm owner, and the three men who are in love with her. She has to make some difficult choices, some of which bring tragedy to her life, but ultimately she finds true love.

As with most classics, there is a lot of setup in the first chapters, but once the story gets going, it really moves along! Towards the middle and end, I was gasping and crying and laughing my head off. It’s definitely a wild story at times, and so brilliantly written.

Hardy has a reputation for writing depressing stuff, and there were some terrible depressing scenes that had me crying and horrified. But the ending is happy, so I was buoyed up again. Continue reading →