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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. The Toilers of the Sea is a bittersweet story, and while not in quite the vein of Hunchback and Les Mis it is still completely Victor Hugo. Gilliatt, the protagonist of this novel, undergoes what I can only compare to the mythical trials of Odysseus. In order to receive what he wants most, he must undertake the impossible. But, in the end, though he conquered wind and sea, battled monsters and his own failings, he forgot to anticipate the working of another human heart. His ending is both heartfelt and heartbreaking. Simply a lovely novel. While filled with typical Hugo over indulgence in descriptions, the final narrative is definitely worth the read. (  ) Alera | Oct 23, 2009 |  I had mixed feelings about this. The first 140 pages were quite colourful and absorbing, albeit complete with the lengthy digressions and evocative descriptions of buildings, especially old and dilapidated ones, that are typical of Hugo's prose. However, the next 140 pages were very dull and overblown, with endless description of rocks and sea and storms and a wrecked ship, with no characters other than the central one. After a while, I simply had to skim most of this section to get to the more interesting final section. That was worth it, with a bittersweet and tragic ending. So a mixed bag, a book of two halves, not in the same league as Les Miserables or Hunchback, but worth having got through in the end. ( ) john257hopper | Dec 7, 2008 |  no reviews | add a review
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(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:05 -0400)
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