What can I say? 'Tis the season. This was my third Charles Dickens effort. The first one was Great Expectations, which was school-enforced reading that I didn't really enjoy. The second one was A Tale of Two Cities, a book I read on my own accord that I thought was beautiful and moving, but still didn't love. My issue with both novels, the former more than the latter, was Dickens' excessive use of words in general. When you're an author who gets paid by the word, it turns out, you have quite an incentive to say as little as possible in as many words as possible. Anyway, that's been my major gripe with Dickens going back as long as I've been reading him. But I was looking forward to A Christmas Carol for two key reasons. One, since it's only 80 pages long, Dickens was only going to be able to be so loquacious in his narrative. And, two, since I was fairly familiar with the characters and the story going in, having seen or read an adaptation or two in my day, I figured even the ramblier moments would be easier to deal with. And they were. And the book was just fine, actually, and maybe even somewhat enjoyable. It was the same old story I'm sure you're all well aware of, and nothing more. Still, it feels nice to have it checked off my backlog list. Merry Christmas everyone.
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