June week 5

Another book assigned to me to read is called 'Bleak House' by Charles Dickens. Unlike the first book 'Rebecca' which managed to win my interest from the beginning, Bleak House was a tough one to read at first. Riding on my rare keenness to read after enjoying 'Rebecca', I just wanted to get on with this next book. But before I could to attempt to drown myself into the story, a friend of mine dared me to read the first page and understand it. I did that and lifted my head from behind the book and laughed with my friend. She proved herself right. I think it was deliberate that the author introduced the story in such a confusing way, no head or tail. There is a lot on Jarndyce and Jarndyce, an ongoing court case that could never be resolved and about muddy and damp streets in London. I couldn't wrap my mind around this and with an unimpressive start, I dragged on. It took me a few days just to move to another chapter, trust me it's actually really short, given it's a short version of the book. Luckily, I finally understood the story as I went on and found myself even liking it. Instead of the dreary court matters that is spotlighted, most of the story circled around  Esther, Ada and Richard. I liked the even focus on the three characters, Richard's deadly obsession with the Jarndyce and Jarndyce case as he hopes for a big fortune out of it, Ada's solicitude towards Richard and Esther's discovery of her birth mother as well as her relationship with her guardian, John Jarndyce and her lover, Allan Woodcourt. Overall, the mood of the story is rather bleak as its name suggests, but the storyline is quite brilliant and I quickly forgot how hard it was to read this book at the beginning.