The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy

Thomas Hardy's writing was as dark and melancholy as I'd heard it was, but The Mayor of Casterbridge had a happy ending, and that always redeems a book in my eyes. The story was riveting, and the style was comprehensible. A man, in a drunken impulse, sells his wife and daughter to a passing sailor. The rest of the book chronicles the results of this, the ensuing tangle and and confusion of relations as the years progress, and the final state of affairs after all the threads have been sorted out.

The characters are interesting, but not terribly engaging. Henchard is the faulty man whose overly impulsive nature ultimately destroys him. Elizabeth-Jane is supposed to be the daughter whom Henchard sold, but is actually the offspring of Henchard's wife and the sailor. Elizabeth-Jane, through tenacious self-discipline and a strong sense of propriety, develops into a sensible, well-informed girl. She eventually marries well, forming the happy ending I mentioned before.

Most of the story is the interplay of the various connected people, and it is fun to follow. Because the reader does not form much emotional attachment to the characters, due perhaps to the author's intent, one can just stand a distance and events resolve themselves into a cohesive narrative. A lot of the novel is rather sad and pathetic, but not all of it. Elizabeth-Jane begins with the view that life is mostly a tragedy punctuated intermittently with moments of happiness, but by the end such an outlook is modified a bit, because her situation has become one of complete satisfaction.