I briefly toyed with taking off a half star for all of the lengthy tangents Hugo employs, most of which do little or nothing to advance the story, but damn, the book is so so so good anyway, I just couldn't do it. It took me 2 and 1/2 months to read it, but I was barreling through the last few hundred pages as Hugo brought all of the different threads together and created a crescendo so compelling and beautiful that it was virtually impossible to put down. There are a number of classics that I do not like because they lack coherent plots or have zero likeable characters. That was not the case with this one. I ached for Jean Valjean and everything he went through. The characters were so rich ... the internal dialogue of Javert at the end was a masterclass in and of itself ... and the plot was literally sublime. I am not a religious person, but I could still appreciate the religious overtones in the book and not feel preached at. Just so so so so so good. ( )

Esta novela trata los valores que había en la sociedad francesa a mediados del siglo XIX y sobre como lo afrontan las personas ante estas adversidades. ( )

Location : NWS

Listened to the audiobook version of this classic novel and it took me quite a while to get through the entire book. I was fascinated by the descriptions of society still grappling with its recent history of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars, but there's a lot more to this novel. I think I need to return to this book again, but to actually read the print version, as the audiobook didn't really work for me in this particular case. ( )

Es la historia de Jean Valjean, un convicto que estuvo injustamente encarcelado por 19 años por haberse robado una rebanada de pan. Al ser liberado de su injusta condena, Valjean trata de escapar de su pasado, lleno de maldad y depravación, para vivir una vida digna y honesta. Sin embargo, esto se ve truncado al ser reconocido por el inspector Javert, quien lo persigue obsesionadamente para enviarlo de nuevo a prisión. Esta persecución consume la vida de ambos hombres, terminando en un inesperado desenlace.