War and Peace (Wordsworth Classics)

Best cover art in my opinion for classics.

I ordered the paperback book because I had never read this classic story. It arrived timely and in perfect condition. It's easy to hold and to read.

I appreciate the ability to select gifts on Amazon to send my grandchildren.

I don't know if it's just because of this Maude translation (which is itself 90 years old) but W&P reads like a modern novel, not one from the 19th century. Very impressive. Just a few nitpicks:-Every so often Tolstoy interrupts the narrative to describe his theory of how history works. There's nothing wrong with that and it was actually pretty interesting, but he went way overboard with it in the second epilogue. Fifty or so pages of it is just too much, especially since he's pretty much just saying the same thing over and over.-Lots of characters to keep up with. It was easy to keep track of the important ones, but there are several minor characters introduced who disappear for huge chunks only to show up again long after I've forgotten who they are.-MOST of the French dialogue is translated into English, but this particular translation leaves some lines here and there annoyingly untranslated. It's fine if they wanted to preserve the "flavor" of the dialogue, but there should have been footnoted translations. A character will say something in French (or in one case German) and another character will be like "Wow. That's a good point," but I'll have no idea what that point was. Not a big deal though.

UPDATE: Have got through over 200 pages and found the size of the print not as bad as I thought it would be. All in all the book is an interesting read. I keep three bookmarks in place #1 at the list of the main characters, #2 at place I'm at and #3 at the notes section.Haven't started reading yet, but buyer beware. This book is in very small print and will be a challenge to read. For the price I'm going to try it, but I think it will be a challenge.

I bought this as a gift for my young adult niece, she is really enjoying it!

This book with all the interesting facts about the ocean and its sea life kept me at my phone (on the internet) constantly. I followed the Nautilus's path, and often looked up what the sea life was, along with the suboceanic geology so accurate as known in the 19th century. The characters were brilliantly brought to life. There's an enormous amount of facts and adventures to enjoy. I'll move on to the next Verne classic now.

In contrast to its noted long length, I will suffice it to say that I love Tolstoy and his gentile, nuanced, and pragmatic writing. So many characters and so much history will be etched in my mind thanks to this work.