Reading War and Peace always appears to be the butt of some joke about what one would do if given enough time to read. Now having read Tolstoy's book (albeit the revised abridged translated version) I can say there should be no joke. What an incredibly interesting and engaging novel. Following Napolean's war against Russia, this was a great read. Note to future readers--I used as a bookmark a little diagram mapping out who the various main characters were and how they were related: very helpful until you become familiar with Prince Andrei, Nikolai Rostof, Natasha Rostof, Pierre, and the others and their families!

And it is interesting to read from the Russian point of view. Many years ago I read a book which was the diary of a Napoleanic foot solider (now lost) which gave the French perspective (or rather the perspective of the lowly private). ( )