I’m going to forgive Tolstoy and allow him this one scene of melodrama with the ‘little princess’, the birth, and the husband. He did have to write for an audience after all, so a good tear-jerk never hurts sales. Still though, I could have done without it.

The novel still is holding steady at my #1 spot of all time, however. The scene with Napoleon surveying the foggy field of battle was pure genius. Pure Genius.