Title: The Mayor of Casterbridge     

Author: Thomas Hardy

Genre: Classics

Publisher: Penguin English Library  

Format: Paperback

Pages: 384

Rating: 4/5 stars

Synopsis (Goodreads):

‘I’ve not always been what I am now’

In a fit of drunken anger, Michael Henchard sells his wife and baby daughter for five guineas at a country fair. Over the course of the following years, he manages to establish himself as a respected and prosperous pillar of the community of Casterbridge, but behind his success there always lurk the shameful secret of his past and a personality prone to self-destructive pride and temper. Subtitled ‘A Story of a Man of Character’, Hardy’s powerful and sympathetic study of the heroic but deeply flawed Henchard is also an intensely dramatic work, tragically played out against the vivid backdrop of a close-knit Dorsetshire town.

This edition includes an introduction, chronology of Hardy’s life and works, the illustrations for the original Serial Issue, place names, maps, glossary, full explanatory notes as well as Hardy’s prefaces to the 1895 and 1912 editions.

Review:

Oh Thomas Hardy, the author that knows how to play with your heart strings and provide you with an emotional gut punch!

The book is about a young man who makes a terrible decision while drunk one day, and has to live and suffer the consequences of it. While he rises in the towns society and eventually becomes the mayor, he is still haunted by his actions and tries to make things right!

The characters in the book are really well developed and make you love them (and maybe hate them) for so many different reasons! You hate Michael, the mayor of Casterbridge, but you also empathize with a man who wants to right his wrongs and do what’s best. You also want to believe that people can change and that they turn out for the better. His daughter, Elizabeth Jane, so sweet and kind and you just can’t help but love her calm demeanour. And can I say plot twists!! Oh my the plot twists! Just when I thought I knew what was going to happen, something else would occur that would throw me through a loop!

I love Hardy as an author, and loved this book. I highly recommend it if you’re looking for a good classic!

Happy reading!