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patricia_baker's review against another edition
2.0
Read this for book club and was not impressed. The story about the final days of Leo Tolstoy was mildly interesting, but I did not find a single character likable. Not one. Not even Tolstoy managed to generate kind feelings. The whole thing was just sad.
cjdawn236's review against another edition
3.0
This book wasn't extremely exciting, in fact it moved rather slowly at times, but it was still a really interesting look at the last year of Leo Tolstoy's life. What made it most intesting is the fact that it's told from multiple points of view, not just one, so you get an idea what everyone around Tolstoy was going through during that time period. I learned a lot about Tolstoy from reading this novel.
lizruest's review against another edition
3.0
A good prep/background for the movie, which I'd love to see soon.
caterinaanna's review against another edition
4.0
I knew Tolstoy was popular in his time, but until I read this book, I had no idea he was such an inspiration, nor did I have much idea of his politics in spite of having read both [b:Anna Karenina|152|Anna Karenina|Leo Tolstoy|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41%2ByPuObjAL._SL75_.jpg|2507928] and [b:War Peace|656|War and Peace|Leo Tolstoy|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1222897284s/656.jpg|4912783].
While it was easy to dislike everyone in the book, but I was able to find some sympathy for most of them. The one exception was Chertkov, maybe because he was the one major character who was never, as far as I remember, given the chance to tell a part of the story himself. While I didn't agree with or like the actions of the others, I felt I could at least understand their motivations, why each of them thought they were doing the right thing, and that made it easier to accept their actions. However there was nothing to make me think of Chertkov as anything but a cynical glory-seeker.
On my to-be-read-one-day are some of Tolstoy's more philosophical writings, as my quote to remember from this book is: ,i>God is not love, but the more love there is in man, the more is God made manifest in him, and the more truly does he exist.
While it was easy to dislike everyone in the book, but I was able to find some sympathy for most of them. The one exception was Chertkov, maybe because he was the one major character who was never, as far as I remember, given the chance to tell a part of the story himself. While I didn't agree with or like the actions of the others, I felt I could at least understand their motivations, why each of them thought they were doing the right thing, and that made it easier to accept their actions. However there was nothing to make me think of Chertkov as anything but a cynical glory-seeker.
On my to-be-read-one-day are some of Tolstoy's more philosophical writings, as my quote to remember from this book is: ,i>God is not love, but the more love there is in man, the more is God made manifest in him, and the more truly does he exist.