I have to admit that I was warned about this one. Though the book is easy to read and really quite well written, the story line is really dark. I will still probably watch the movie based on the book because the story is intriguing, but I rated it slightly lower simply because it did make my stomach turn slightly to keep reading. Extra points for sucking me in though. It's a wreck that you just can't turn away from.

I'm glad I stuck it out with this book. For the first thirty or so pages the writing came off as too pompous and I thought it was just going to be dry and boring. I very nearly stopped reading. The writing style seemed to shift slightly after the start and I was able to get involved in the plot rather than feeling like I had to find the definition for a word on every page. Nothing makes me want to get rid of a book faster than having it make me feel dumb.

The plot took a little time to get going, but did quite well after the first few sections. I quickly became involved in the book and I got to the point where I couldn't put it down. I would have given it 4 stars, but the ending just didn't suit me. It seemed that it would have been more powerful to end it a few chapters before the end. The last few chapters weren't written with the same care and detail that seemed prevalent through the rest of the book. I ended up feeling a little bit let down.

This was not my favorite of Jane Green's novels. The plot lines were overly fantastical with far too many things going on at once. Though she does manage to develop the characters well and keeps each separate plot line moving well, the story becomes far too unrealistic and it just gets overwhelmed with activity and unfortunate events and circumstances. I found this novel to be more juvenile than her other books due to plot and story development, though the writing style seems more progressive than her prior novels. It was a very fast read, which I think saved it somewhat. Had the plot line slowed at all I think this may have been a book I put down. In fact, the quick moving plot and attention to detail are the only things that saved this book for me and bumped it from two stars to three. If I didn't have a history of reading Jane Green's novels and didn't know what she is capable of, I don't know that I would read another one after this.

This one was a mixed bag for me. I had absolutely no knowledge of the history of the Congo prior to reading this book. Learning about the historical events (though somewhat altered to adhere to a fictional story) was quite intriguing for me. As far as the reading goes, it took me a little work to get into the story. Each section is written in chapters from the point of view of five different characters (a mother and her four daughters). I found it especially hard to read the chapters written by one of the daughters as she has what I will refer to as quirks in her personality that heavily effect the writing. I tended to lose my focus during these chapters and found that they were often the places where I put the book down for a while. Once I was able to get into the story (and some what ignore Adah's odd writing) the pages went fairly quickly and I was able to form an attachment to some of the characters.

While the story is good and the historical details are well written, I kept myself from giving this book four stars simply because of the length. While there was quite a bit of time to cover, there were sections that were highly superfluous and added nothing to the story. Had they been pertinent issues then I don't think the length would've been a problem. Out of the over 800 pages, I would dare say that at least 100 of them could have been eliminated without having any effect on the book as a whole. That being said, the writing is easy to read and the story did for the most part retain my attention. I would definitely read other books by this author...I'm just hoping that her other novels show more restraint in timeline detail.

This book took me forever to read. I loved the story but there were it honestly felt like I was reading two separate books. Mr. Hugo has a tendency to think that the reader needs to understand the entire history of France in order to follow the plot of his novel. This is not so. If I wished to understand the entire history of France then I would read a book on the history of France. I found his side trips to be distracting to the story and frustrating to me as the reader. Honestly, I started to skip pages in these sections because they had little to no effect on my understanding or appreciation of the novel. Had these portions not been present, I honestly would've probably given the book five stars. I love his attention to detail and his development of the character of Jean Valjean. It was still a good read.