A Tale of Two Cities

 

***1/2

PG-13?

{L} {SM/V}

Could Recommend

I read this years ago and remember really liking it.

Then, I forgot the whole story.

Last month, my son was in a stage production called The Secret of Madame Defarge.

It was pretty dark and sad.  I had started rereading this book at the same time I saw the play and was curious to see how true to the book the performance was.  It ended up being pretty much taken right from the novel.  Very bloodthirsty, dark and sad.  However, the whole redeeming twist at the end of the story was not in the production, which was focused on Madame Defarge, so that made the book a little easier to swallow than the performance :)

I will not deny that it absolutely is a classic and does teach some good lessons.

There were one or two instances of the Lord's name taken in vain {Language} and with it being the French Revolution, there is much bloodshed so I gave the rating of {Subject Matter}/{Violence}.

I did find this was not one of Dicken's easiest narratives to follow (let's just say I was really glad I had just seen a stage adaptation so I was familiar with what was going on).  Aside from these things I could recommend reading it to someone who is willing to look past the dark stain of blood.