A review by deaconlenny
The Story of the Stone, Volume I: The Golden Days, Chapters 1-26 by Cao Xueqin

lighthearted slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.25

With almost zero historical knowledge of the context in which this book was met (save for the extensive preface), I don’t know how I should judge its prosaic merit. To my eyes, it reads like a Brontë or some such “court intrigue”-type novel and, by that measure, does not interest me very much narratively. Not much really happens, per se, and what does happen isn’t much more than the kind of melodrama bred by idle lives — in this case those of a sort of quasi-but-precarious aristocracy(?) Some chapters seem wholly out of place given the overall chasteness of the writing, which were naturally the chapters I found most interesting. Otherwise it was a lot of small violences of the extremely mundane persuasion. I may have to withhold judgment until I complete the other four volumes, but we’ll see how far I get down that path.