The Count of Monte Cristo!!! I heard you may or may not be reading this book Ken if you are here's your spoiler alert. Finally I feel like I've read a good book, and it's been a long time since I had that feeling. This book had it all and then some, despite being abridged coming in just shy of 600 pages instead of the over 1000 page behemoth that the full version is. One thing that I loved was I kept getting sucked into the details of the Count's wealth and glamor and forgot that he was constantly master mining the destruction of all the people around him. Yet I must say that I was a bit disappointed with the way the three main targets just popped and fizzed away. But I feel that it is quite cohesive because at the time that all his schemes were coming to fruition he was distracted trying to tie up the unexpected backlash of said schemes. Which backlash is quite entertaining as the Count fancied himself all-knowing only to find out that his supposed omniscience fell short. Further I must admit that I got more into the side story of young Maxmillion Morrel and Valentine than I did the main story line. My only complaint was the end, I felt that Mercedes got a bit too much punishment for her crimes, which were nil, and I didn't care for the way the Count, "Sailed off into the sunset."
Overall though it was an awesome read. The whole book just flowed with a refreshing pace that held my attention and interest constantly through to the end. I read 600 pages of Monte Cristo in a fraction of the time it took me to read the last two books that were a fraction of the length. Why? Because it didn't suck it was so very good!!
PS: I liked my abridged version because it had endnotes that would quickly sum up plot points that I'm sure would have amounted to hundreds of excess pages in the full-length version.
