Michelle’s Comments (group member since Mar 16, 2015)

Michelle’s comments from the Classics for Beginners group.

Susan wrote: "Finished the story and enjoyed it much more than I thought it would. I liked the way the narration jumped back and forth as it kept me grounded and half-way focused on Noel. Bit of a sad, nostalgic..."

A very good point about the narration. I hadn't thought about it keeping Noel in the story.

Louise wrote: "Oh my word, is Joe irritating! Loved the Malay parts, just heading into the Australia part now and have a suspicion that the more I have to read about Joe, the less I will like the book."

LOL. I don't know what part of the book you are reading but I thought he got better as it went along. I tried to remember that this was written in a different era.

I felt like it was both a love story and a story of heroism. Both Jean and Joe acted heroically. I would actually have liked a little more emphasis on that part of the story. As it was and with the third person narration it felt like an extremely long introduction for the love story. I would also have liked to have felt less detachment from the main characters via the third person narration throughout the book. I did appreciate toward the end of the book , however, that this form of narration allowed the author to give more of an overview which was important to a story of this scope.

I have finished and I did enjoy the book very much. The combination of hero saga and romance was very appealing. I also enjoyed the view presented of the war in the Pacific. Did anyone else find the third person narration awkward? I felt it just didn't work in the first half of the book. Toward the end of the book I found it worked better but I still wonder why the author chose that method of telling his story.

Just starting (Chpt. 6). I wondered about the word madding also Emily so thanks for the explanation. I wonder about a lot of the words since as pointed out above they are antiquated. I did find myself smiling at Farmer Oaks proposal though, so I would have to say I am enjoying myself. In spite of the wordy descriptions (or because of), I find that Hardy paints a very clear picture in my mind of the characters and the story.