A review by theteaisaddictive
Moby Dick by Herman Melville

adventurous informative reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? N/A
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Moby Dick is the story of a gay man and his 500-page infodump about sperm whales to avoid talking about the main source of his trauma. My main frustrations with this book (whales aside — that’s like complaining about Waterloo or the sewers when reading Les Mis) is that Ishmael the narrator seems hardly present in his own story once he’s on the ship. It’s frustrating from a storytelling lens, although I can fully admit that this may just be my own modern biases/experiences reading stories coming into play here.