South Riding

This was really good. It's more a book about a place than any specific characters, but we do see characters grow and change. Some people have happy endings, others don't.

In a lot of ways this is really bleak. There's poverty or near-poverty, sickness, potential scandals... There's a lot going on, but Holtby's writing is really beautiful and still hopeful. It's a long book, and I did struggle with the length at points, but I really enjoyed it all in the end. I'll have to read more by Holtby in the future.

I wanted to finish this by months end and I did! Thank you to the group, Reading the Twentieth Century, to get me to finally give this another shot. (My previous attempt began in June 2012 and was cut off when we moved and I just didn't have it in me to continue at that point.)