Bienvenue à Paris - The Count of Monte Christo, thread 2

[LeylaOfCircassia]

Welcome back - we now find ourselves in Paris, where we have discovered:

• the Count has unlimited resources
• apparently unlimited patience
• is being rather harsh on Mercedes
• has unmasked adultery and a rather tragic act and reunited father, mother and son, but with an incestuous twist, everyone remains in innocent ignorance
• grandparents have died, there may have been foul play
• a couple of women don't want to marry a couple of men, who in turn, also don;t want to marry them

If you are new and joining us - God Speed.

Previous thread here

Next week, from 31st
Monday - Lemonade
Tuesday - The Accusation
Wednesday - The Retired Baker’s Room
Thursday - Breaking and Entering
Friday - The Hand of God
Saturday - Beauchamp
Sunday - rest

You might be causing a little run on it as all MNers order it at once!

My copy is due for delivery tomorrow!

To be honest, it’s £10 cheaper on Kindle but for some reason I feel I need a physical copy

Is anyone following the Footnotes and Tangents readalong of A Place of Greater Safety? I am, have managed to keep up so far, and am enjoying the book. I enjoy Laclos being a character in it after our Liaisons readalong! Have been listening to the podcast he recommends (Revolutions) which has helped. I really enjoy the weekly updates but haven’t joined the chat. Is a very different experience from the readalongs here.

Ha ha 😄😄

That sounds cool @CornishLizard

I am not sure I could keep up with anything else, or add another platform to my life - well not right now anyway. Definitely something to consider in the future.

Yes @CornishLizard I am too. I’m finding it heavy going tbh. I loved Wolf Hall etc but am finding APOGS more confusing, trying to keep track of everyone, and I think it suffers from having three protagonists instead of one.

I follow the notes but also haven’t commented : I got more out of those readalongs on Insta as the commenting was more immediate.

It’s part of a French stack at the moment; I’m reading Simon Kuper’s Impossible City about modern Paris and Nancy Mitford’s Madame de Pompadour as well. Paris is the constant and I keep jumping though the same places in different times!

It’s definitely quite a project. Don’t think I’d be persevering without the readalong. I bought it from Oxfam and the volunteer said it was hard work! She had read a history alongside it - the podcast is working well for me as I wouldn’t want to read a NF history with it. I’m hoping to stay the course having got this far as it’s been on my list for a long time. Had intended to get ahead with PoGS before the KL starts but haven’t managed that! Madame de Pompadour looks interesting.

I read APoGS a while ago now. I had abandoned it quite early on (describing Camille's childhood and youth) but eventually went back to it and just roared through it.

I did know quite a bit about the history, which helped, but it's a strange and bitty book, with some characters suddenly disappearing. I remember developing a deep, visceral loathing for Antoine St Just! It was a totally insane period in history.

I have lent it to a few people who couldn't get on with it at all, mainly people who loved WH.

i think I’m so far in I’ll finish it now and it is fascinating, but I can’t say I’ve enjoyed it really.

Mitford is pretty high handed in her commentary - she put me off a bit when she said Louis XV’s Queen was « old and boring » for not being as keen on court life after she had borne him ten children. Ten! I thought, You bloody try it and then see how you feel about balls and gambling and dancing!

Hello everyone. I dropped off the thread as I finished the book early but have really enjoyed reading everyone's insights. I wasn't going to join in with the next one as I really struggled with the pace this time. I was always way behind or way ahead! I'm also running a book club this year so have to really prioritize those books. That said, this one's been on my tbr list for yonks so I am going to give it a go. When do we start?😀

July, I think, @Buttalapasta 🙂

Yep, 1 July. Will start a placeholder thread, when I actually get hold of the book, which has proven more difficult than my access to really quite well placed bookshops suggests it should be.

Blackwells has multiple copies of the omnibus. They also have the individual books in the trilogy for those who prefer their books a more manageable size.

I’m away until the 5th but will start reading as soon as I return and catch up!

Don't want to rush you, but the 1st is on Tuesday. It would be good to get a thread up to get some more people on board.

I have received my physical copy but am on holiday until 3rd so will be playing catch-up as the book weighs a ton so didn't bring it with me.

I actually bought the whole trilogy a few years ago at @JaninaDuszejko 's recommendation! But at the time the 3-in-1 volume wasn't available, so I got the three separate Penguin volumes, and they were shipped to me all the way from the US (?!). Clearly it's easier to get your hands on the books in the UK now.

I never finished reading the trilogy but am keen to go back to it now. I recall being a bit troubled by what I perceived as implicit religious conservatism on the part of the author (she converted to Catholicism while writing the books I think). But I'm hypersensitive to that, because I grew up in a nutty right-wing fundamentalist family and have a bit of PTSD as a result (I'm only half-joking!). So will try to put aside my prejudices and read with an open mind.

I'm looking forward to getting started.
I'll be reading it on Kindle.

There is a lot about religion in the book but as an athiest who grew up in a not very religious household I only read it as period appropriate. It's a hundred year old book set in the 14th century, religion is naturally a big part of the story.

That's very true about religion being an intrinsic part of the European Middle Ages, @JaninaDuszejko . Anyway I'm keen to go back to the novel and start it again with a fresh eye. I''m sure I'll get more out of reading it as part of a read-along; I always do!

Sorry if all this has been discussed before but I have a couple of questions-

• Are we reading a chapter a day?
• When do we discuss?

Thanks!

Ive only done this read along for the COMC, so I'm not an expert, but I assume it's normally a chapter a day then come on the thread to discuss.

We have hit a slight hitch as the person who said they would run the new thread has been unable to get hold of a copy. I don't know if someone else can start it, or if we want to go ahead anyway or postpone - maybe until September?

Yes, I think the plan was chapter a day starting today. For the last read along we had Sundays off (so some of us could catch up!)

I am now with my copy of KL (and assume @AgualusasLover @LeylaOfCircassia is still waiting for a copy!) and have done the following analysis:

Book 1 has 23 chapters
Book 2 has 22 chapters
Book 3 has 22 chapters
so a total of 67 chapters

Chapters are an average of 16.5 pages long (so longer than TCOMC chapters) which may be more challenging to fit in.

We could do 5 chapters a week (Monday-Friday) and give ourselves the weekend to catch up. That would mean it would take us just over 13 weeks to read it.

Or we could do one chapter over 2 days and read three chapters a week which would mean it would take us just over 22 weeks to read it taking us up to almost Christmas!

Or we could it another way. Any thoughts, preferences?