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serendipitysbooks's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
The Book of Anna is a sort of sequel to Anna Karenina, one with a very meta angle since Tolstoy himself appears, albeit in a dream, and his characters (most especially Anna’s son Sergei) are very aware that they are characters written by him, leading them to wonder about whether they actually have any agency of their own. Anna Karenina’s legacy is present in the form of a portrait the Tsar requisitions, and the discovery of the manuscript for a fairytale she wrote. This story is centred around the time of the 1905 Russian Revolution and it does a nice job depicting the class divide that led to it. I enjoyed the playful aspects of this book such as the way it poked fun at Tolstoy’s tendency to have multiple characters with the same name. I loved what Clementine brought to the story, the way she showed both the contribution of and constraints faced by female revolutionaries. I do feel like some of this book went over my head and I wonder how much I missed because my reading of Anna Karenina was more than a decade ago and many details are more than a little hazy.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence and Death
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