Anna Karenina

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy, 938 pages

This summer's Big Book Challenge, Anna Karenina is the tale of the tragic titular character, who falls in love with the dashing military officer Vronsky, despite already being married with a child. The real main character, however, is Konstantin Levin, an awkward aristocrat trying to come to terms with marriage, family, and farming (though not necessarily in that order). This is the second time I've read this book, and this time around, I found Levin a much more endearing character, particularly his all-too-human social foibles (and shockingly, the farming passages didn't annoy me nearly as much this time around). Tolstoy did a great job of bringing both an awkward man and a self-centered woman to life, fleshing out their distinct social situations and thoughts quite well.