2019 Chapter-a-Day Read-along Wrap Up
Thank you to everyone who participated in this year’s Chapter-a-Day Read-along, whether you read all four books or limited yourself to one, two or three of them. In this post I’ll share a few of my reflections on the year, and I would love to know your thoughts about the experience. I invite you to leave a comment on this post to share what reading a chapter a day was like for you.
First of all, while I still love Don Quixote, I am not sure that reading a chapter a day is the best way to experience it. The exploits of the Don and his squire Sancho Panza may be better read at a quicker pace in order for the humor and the episodic nature of the story to work more effectively.
On the other hand, The Count of Monte Cristo was a great pleasure to read in a chapter a day. The deliberate pace allowed me to really appreciate the complexity of the plot and the relationships between the characters. For me, reading The Count of Monte Cristo was the most enjoyable chapter-a-day experience of the year.
Reading Lilith was a challenge. It was much more “out there” than I expected it to be, even for someone like me who has read a lot of fantasy. If I had the year to do over, I would change this book to something else.
Finally, the year ended with The Old Curiosity Shop by Charles Dickens. This was a very different book than I was expecting. For a book with “curiosity shop” in the title, there wasn’t very much of the curiosity shop in the plot. I also felt the book had too many coincidences and the ending was extremely unsatisfactory.
As you hopefully know already, next year’s chapter-a-day read-along starts tomorrow and is one long book, War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. See the announcement post to sign up, and get ready for another chapter-a-day literary journey.
Thanks again for participating, and please leave your comments below.
I completely agree with your summary comments on each book. I love Don Quixote and have had a variety of experiences with it. Most memorable was an adult-education class with a former Spanish priest who so thoroughly loved the book that he treated it as a kind of secular scripture. In middle school I had loved The Three Musketeers but had never read any other Dumas. The Count of Monte Cristo ranks as one of the two or three best adventure books ever, in my view (Beau Geste is another favorite, although the final chapters are anticlimactic). I had to read Lilith in 2-3 sittings even to keep track of what was happening. The Old Curiosity Shop is not great Dickens, but even second-rate Dickens is better than most other novels. Plus now I know who Little Nell is.
Thank you for all the thought and time and effort you put into these read-alongs, Nick. They are highly pleasurable ways to expand my literary horizons and develop a sense of community.
Thanks for hosting these, Nick! I only made it through Monte Cristo, but it was *so* good.
I enjoyed reading The Count of Monte Cristo, and the read-along format gave me the push to make it through at a good pace.
I’m also happy for the exposure to Lilith, even though I can’t say it’s recommended reading on my list. But knowing about a writer who influenced C.S. Lewis (who definitely wrote multiple recommended reads!) was worth the time I spent with the book.