96. "Sophie's Choice," William Styron

Sometimes, you start reading a book and get so engrossed in it that you can't put it down until you're done. Other times, you care so little for a novel that you dare only read a small bit at a time and it takes forever to finish. For me, Sophie's Choice was neither of these. This book has taken me several weeks to read, but not from any dislike. In truth, my schedule just didn't allow for long stands of reading. Even if it had, however, I think I prefer the way this went. Having more time to ruminate on the events of the story allowed them to become all the more real. Being over 500 pages also makes it easy to stretch out the reading time!

The novel opens with a young Southerner, fresh out of service in World War II (though not having seen active duty) trying to find his way in the literary world of New York City. Things go poorly, he looses his job and has to find a cheaper rooming house. Here, he receives money from his father to allow him to live his dream of writing the last authentic Southern novel. He also meets the titular Sophie and her lover Nathan. The entirety of the novel rests on the love triangle formed by these three and the increasingly intimate details that get uncovered of each of them. Centrally, Sophie was a non-Jewish "Polack" interned at Auschwitz and has suffered loss on a level that few, if any, readers will be able to truly understand. Nathan is a truly unstable figure that is allowed to live a life of fantasy in an attempt to reign him in, albeit unsuccessfully. Stingo is the narrator and I'm not entirely sure whether it is also Styron or not. So much of his personal revelations seem to be so detailed that it is easy to assume the author is writing autobiographically.

This novel is an amazing work in character development. Every time you learn something new about a character, you're simply chomping at the bit to learn more. You come to love some characters and hate and fear others. I suppose it may have been different had I not allowed this story to simmer, thereby forming connections with characters that a quick read may not have spawned. Nonetheless, I am happy to have read this book. I've been curious as to how some of the previous titles made their way on to this list, but having read this one I'm confident that there will be some quality works to come...