Review: The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas

This swashbuckling tale of derring do, gambling, drinking, getting money off your mistress because you've spent it all on the gambling and drinking, challenging people to duels, dashing to England and back, and generally being a total seventeenth-century badass is, in short, a fantastic read.

Title & Author: The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
Published: 1844
Pages: 720 (Penguin, 1982)
Read: 13/01/13 - 23/01/13
Series: The D'Artagnan Romances #1
Challenge(s): Project Fill in the Gaps
Status: Owned book

Synopsis: One of the most celebrated and popular historical romances ever written, The Three Musketeers tell the story of the early adventures of the young Gascon gentleman D'Artagan and his three friends from the regiment of the King's Musketeers - Athos,Porthos and Aramis.

Under the watchful eye of their patron M. de Treville, the four defend the honour of the regiment against the guards of the Cardinal Richelieu, and the honour of the queen against the machinations of the Cardinal himself as the power struggles of seventeenth-century France are vividly played out in the background. (from Goodreads)

Review: I have to admit, much of my knowledge of this book comes from the adaptations of it, especially the cartoon Dogtanian (what?  It was a favourite of mine as a kid.  And my friend who is Dumas obsessed says it's probably the most faithful adaptation she's ever watched).  So while I knew the gist of the story going in I wasn't prepared for how dark the book would get - the ending if more tragedy than comedy - or how daft the Musketeers frequently were when it came to anything involving money.  They may have been living the lives of seventeenth century heroes, but they could have at least tried to have some money set by for (picking an example purely at random) buying the equipment they'd need to go to war.  Seriously, guys, think ahead.

The plot itself will be familiar to most: D'Artagnan, a young hot-headed Gascon, travels to Paris to seek his fortune as a member of the King's Musketeers.  He finds out that he can't just wander in and become a Musketeer, and in the course of discovering this he ends up challenging three of the other Musketeers to consecutive duels.  These fights don't actually come off because the four of them are attacked by the Cardinal's guards and I thought the 1970s adaptation (with Michael Yorke as D'Artagnan) was exaggerating how many sword fights these guys get into but it is constant.  Anyone who so much as looks at them funny is challenged to a duel.  I think it's possibly this that helps them all become friends, though part of it is probably also the aforementioned inability to save money when they could be out drinking and gambling.

A vast chunk of plot was unfamiliar, however, and this is the part that makes the book so good: Milady and her machinations.  The Cardinal isn't as sinister as I was expecting, but Milady is (as the book frequently puts it) a fiend from hell.  The Musketeers may challenge those who slight them to duels; Milady simply kills anyone in her way, usually with poison or by getting someone else to do it.  She is devious and tricksy and fabulous, and there are so many awesome revelations about her that I'm just going to say you need to read the book because I am not spoiling.  The end is dark and reminded me of the darker moments of The Count of Monte Cristo - I genuinely didn't expect it to end that way, or that brutally.

The Three Musketeers is one of those books that I thought I knew, but I was still surprised by it.  Well worth reading for the swashbuckling romance alone, it's also a fantastic story that - as usual with Dumas - keeps you turning the pages so quickly that it's size feels less daunting.

Rating: 8/10

Review: The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

Falsely accused of treason, Edmond Dantes is imprisoned in the infamous Chateau d'If.  There he meets the Abbe Faria, who educates him and tells him of the legendary treasure of Monte Cristo.  After a daring (and somewhat foolhardy) escape, Edmond finds the treasure, re-invents himself as the fabulously wealthy Count of Monte Cristo, and seeks revenge on those who betrayed him.

Published: 1844-46
Pages: 1,264 (Harper Perennial, 2008)
Read: 20/8/12 - 6/9/12
Challenge(s): Project Fill in the Gaps

First line: "On the 24th of February, 1815, the lookout of Notre-Dame de la Garde signalled the three-master, the Pharaon, from Smyrna, Trieste, and Naples."

Review: I have a couple of confessions to make regarding my reading of this book:

1) Although I've owned a copy for years, I only started reading it recently because I'm hooked on Revenge and had heard that the series was loosely based on this novel.
2) A lot of my ideas about the plot were formed by a trailer I saw years ago for a movie adaptation of the book.  Most of these were completely wrong (which I'm glad about, because the trailer made the story look dire and also pretty much told the entire plot in three minutes).
3) I am ridiculously proud of myself for finishing this book.  Given my usual habit of getting distracted and putting books down to pick them up again years later (if ever), the fact that I stuck with this despite its length makes me feel like I'm owed some sort of prize. 

Now that those are out of the way: I really enjoyed this book.  Despite its somewhat intimidating size and the smallness of the text, it's incredibly easy to read - I'd suddenly find that I'd read over a hundred pages and it was a lot later than I thought.  The plot, though convoluted and complex, keeps you reading, especially when Edmond is the Count and wreaking his revenge and you're not quite sure exactly what he's doing or how the vengeance is going to play out.  There are a lot of characters, all with their own agendas and secrets, which all come into play, and despite the sheer number of plot strands everything is wrapped up at the end - possibly a little too neatly but given the juggling act Alexandre Dumas pulled off this is fine.

My main gripe would be that, at the beginning, Edmond is a prat.  The reader is meant to feel sympathy for him - and I did when everything started going wrong - but at first he's a slightly arrogant, thoughtless prat and, while I didn't want him to end up falsely imprisoned for over a decade, I did want someone to at least tell him off a little.  This lack of sympathy continues, to an extent, while he's in prison and after his escape, mostly because the Count is constantly set up as an almost supernatual, utterly inscrutable being.  One of my favourite "oh, you're just messing with the reader now, Dumas" parts of the entire book is how often the Count disguises himself and gets away with it, the height of this being when he is three 'different' men on the same day to the same investigator.  He's up there with Sherlock Holmes in terms of how well he can disguise himself, and it gets more than a little ridiculous.

This, naturally, follows over into no one who knew him before he went to prison recognizing him (with one logical exception).  The people he's seeking vengeance upon invite him to their homes, ask his advice, and blindly accept that this dude has popped up out of nowhere at exactly the same time that their lives start falling apart.  This is often spoken of as divine providence - and the Count sees himself as an agent of God - but it does raise the question of how justified his actions are: yes, he suffered terribly, but he pushes things to such an extent that there are suicides, murders, madness and the near obliteration of an entire family.  And, while Dumas does deal with the downside of this, it's never clear whether he condemns or condones the Count's actions - though, most likely, the latter, while leaving it uncertain for the reader.

Personally, I think it's all a bit overkill, and the ending is a tiny bit too neat.  There are also several moments when I wanted to shout "just tell each other what's going on!" at a few of the characters, and towards the end there's part where the Count really should have just told Morrel what he was up to, it would have stopped a lot of problems.  Yet, despite my ambivalence towards the central figure - and to most of the characters, if I'm honest - I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book.  It's not a swashbuckling yarn as I expected, and there are times when I thought Dumas was being more than a bit ridiculous with what the Count could achieve, but it was fantastically readable and fun for all that.

My Final Thoughts: Not the most sensible of books, but it doesn't have to be.  Continuity errors abound, the characters frequently fail to recognise someone they knew well unless it's convenient for Dumas, and the outcome of all of the plotting and conniving is, potentially, not worth it.  But, for all that I can see plenty of faults with the book, I'm glad I read it and recommend it to anyone looking for a fun (if long) read.

50 Words or Less: Enjoyable read, worth the time it took to plough through it, but a bit messy and full of moments of incredulity.  Less swashbuckling than expected but lots of plotting and manipulating, which keeps you guessing (which is why I've mentioned as few actual plot details as possible in this review).

Rating: 9/10