A review by finnft4
The Awakening by Kate Chopin

challenging emotional reflective sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

I didn't exactly mind this book, though I didn't have a great time reading it. I think that the message is crucial, especially for its time period, but it suffers from being too dense and prolonging short scenes across multiple pages. I feel like there are a lot of unnecessary moments and events that happen - all of which never exactly serve Edna's character development. The prose is also incredibly bulky (again, this was written in 1899, so it's expected). It mostly lost me about halfway through. 

I think that the ending moments of the novel sort of cemented it as more so a depressing tale of a woman living in the 19th century who is a victim of her time rather than hopeful. This is fine, as long as that sort of storyline is your thing. For me, it felt a bit odd and ill-fitting - leaving a pretty bad taste in my mouth. 

I guess my biggest criticism is that I simply just found it boring, but maybe I'm being influenced by this being an assigned reading. 
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