The Frankenstein's monster might be different from your image. He has intelligence. He wanted to be loved by someone since he was born, but no one would love him because of his ugly appearance. ( )

The premise: seems kind of silly to discuss the premise of Frankenstein, given the fact that the book and its monster is such a prominent figure in pop culture. But in a nutshell, scientist discovers the secret of life and animates a man made up of various parts of different corpses. The experiment works, but our good scientist, Dr. Frankenstein, is horrified by his creation and rejects the monster. The monster pursues, and Dr. Frankenstein's life is never the same.

My Rating

Glad I Borrowed It: that rating's a kind of cheat, but let me explain: 1) I read my husband's copy, which means I didn't spend money for my own copy and 2) it's hard to rate a re-read, let alone a book that's a classic. I firmly believe that Frankenstein is a book that ALL science fiction and horror fans should have under their belt, because it simply says so much and it has most certainly earned its pedestal in both genres. I'm glad to have re-read it, but I feel the same about it now as I did back in high school: it's a good book, but it's not an absolute favorite or anything. It's the writing style that keeps me from connecting, and now that I've read it once, it's easy to see where the book is going in terms of its message and what happens in the plot. Still, the fact that Shelley tackled such huge and heavy topics in her time astounds me, and I have nothing but respect for her. I can only hope that other fans of the genre do too.

Review style: stream of conscious, with questions for those of you who've read the book for the book club. Spoilers? Uh, yes. In all honesty, considering how old the book is, I really shouldn't have to call them spoilers, but some people want the warning, so here it is. SPOILERS. :) Which may be found in my LJ. As always, comments and discussion are most welcome. :)

REVIEW: Mary Shelley's FRANKENSTEIN ( )

Characters Developed

Forget all the Frankenstein stereotypes you know. Forget Igor, grave robbing, neck bolts, electricity, and mobs of angry villagers carrying torches. Victor Frankenstein is a student of natural philosophy (what science was evidently called back then) who plays with chemicals in order to create life from dead tissue. The monster, which remains nameless throughout the story, so frightens Victor that he runs away and tries to forget about it. The monster, initially gentle but driven to cruelty by the repeated condemnation by mankind, vows to ruin Victor's life in return for creating his misery. It's an interesting story, one that touches less obviously on the ethics of scientific experimentation, but says quite a lot about the unfortunate importance of beauty in society. Victor is more naive and pitiful than evil or mad. Definitely one worth reading, but don't go in expecting anything like those famous old movies. ( )

I did not enjoy this book. I should have and probably would have if I hadn't seen so many Frankenstein movies. I knew that the movies veered pretty far from the actual plot of the book, but still expected something more. While the book was probably very scary and very controversial in 1818, it didn't really translate through the centuries. At least for me it didn't. I rated this book based more for being a horror classic and for basically inventing the creature feature horror genre and less on actual entertainment and merit. ( )