Wow, what an incredible book.

I put this book on my list last summer after listening to Barbara's interview on the Ezra Klein show. It jumped to the top of my list when I heard my mom was reading it for book club - her book club has notoriously (for me) good picks.

This book is a retelling of David Copperfield. I haven't read David Copperfield since college, and then only because it was assigned for class. The book it reminded me of was The Goldfinch, by Donna Tartt; a story about a boy growing up, who both beats unbelievably long odds and squanders magically good luck.

The book is written in the first person, and I was surprised how strong of a personality for the narrator came through. The voice felt like the opposite of sanitized. Lived in, idiosyncratic, and with a dry wit. All the secondary characters, too, were so real and knowable. This really is top-shelf fiction.

There's a strong political thread to this story, and reading made me realize how political Dickens must have felt to contemporary readers. The discussion at the end of the book about the difference between land economy and money economy was inspiring; and I was glad to read it and to have it placed within the context of the story.