Vanity Fair Part Two:

Part Two will include Chapters XVI (The Letter on the Pincushion) -- XXX ('The Girl I Left Behind Me').

Hmmmmmmmmmm, am I the only one surprised here?
And what a wonderful hero our Captain Dobbin is turning out to be. I do hope that by book's end things have turned out nicely for him.
I must say that I found the encouragement of the courting of Miss Swartz by Mr. Crawley, the younger, quite odd for the period of time and at the same time found it quite brave of the "younger" to refrain from obedience and follow his heart.
Not only soldiers go to war during this era. Apparently people found battles to be of great entertainment as they followed them and could not get there quickly enough. Amazing more civilians did not die at the front than did.
Miss Amelia is quickly turning to milktoast. Funny, I thought she had more spunk than that and perchance by book's end it will show it's face again.
belva

So they're off to war. As this is a re-read for me there are no surprises and I won't give anything away.

Belva, I am glad you like Dobbin, he is my favourite 'good' character in the book, and Becky is so delightfully 'wicked'.

I am about half way and thoroughly engrossed in the story, almost forgetting to take the turkey out of the oven Christmas eve. No worries, the turkey came out fine.
Dobbin is becoming my favorite character, and I'm happy for Amelia having a good introduction to the boys of the regiment. I loved the part when Amelia went back to her room at her parents house, where she was so sad just weeks before and now wanted to stay - recalling her dreams of Hero George before they were married, how different the real man is! George is defiantly making me nervous -- it doesn't look good for the future. Yes, they are off to war and I'm off to read more...

A great holiday read, beautiful writing -- thanks for selecting this book.