The Vicar of Wakefield

Not every classic story is going to be a five-star read, I guess. I had such high hopes for this book, and for the first half of the book, my hopes were realized. But then I hit the last half, and the story sagged and dragged, and the humor got lost, and it felt like melodrama.

The Vicar of Wakefield is the story of a vicar, his wife, and his children, who live quite comfortably on a sizable inheritance. Things go along quite well until the inheritance is poorly invested and the vicar ends up bankrupt.

Nevertheless, the vicar adjusts to his new circumstances, and the family learns to handle the new ways of life.

But about midway through the story, Goldsmith pulls out all the stops and throws everything disastrous for the family into the plot. It just didn't hold together for me, and the ending seemed exceptionally unlikely.

Overall, a disappointment, one of the few I've had on my Classics Club path.