Hard Times

**UPDATE**
I finished this book a little before Christmas, and I loved it. Something that stood out to me in the novel is that it doesn't take place in London. In fact, there aren't any scenes in London, which I found surprising. Perhaps Dickens wanted some space from the city after writing Bleak House. I was disappointed with the death of one character, who I won't name, and I really wish his fate had been different, but someone had to die, I suppose. While it had elements of humor, the tone of Hard Times was much darker than Bleak House (in my opinion), and the ending was bittersweet, rather than happy. I'll be moving on to Oliver Twist next....

This week I'm reading one of Charles Dickens' classic novels, Hard Times, which was written after Bleak House (one of summer reads for Sewanee SOL). I'm not too far into the novel, but I've already discovered some glorious lines that only Dickens could pull off.

"He [Mr. Bounderby] had not much hair. One might have fancied that he had talked it off, and that what was left, all standing up in disorder, was in that condition from being constantly blown about by his windy boastfulness." (p.38, Hard Times, Bantam Books, 1981)