A review by ahornick
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

4.0

Saw this recommended a lot after reading Anna Karenina. I think the comparison doesn’t extend beyond surface level but you’d probably enjoy one if you liked the other. Not a fault, but Madame Bovary has all around less sympathetic characters. Emma’s blazing path to self destruction is sad to watch but not in the same way as Anna’s.

Also some pretty memorable, grotesque scenes like the blind man, the gangrene incident, and Emma’s gruesome battle with arsenic. She was not rewarded an easy way out that’s for sure…