Jude the Obscure -Thomas Hardy

I have a confession to make, for a large part of my life when asked for my favourite book of all time, my answer was Jude the Obscure. I think there’s a little bit of Jude in all of us. Frustrated yearning, deep seated self doubt, that feeling that everything would be fine if you could just make yourself be a little bit different! Fortunately, laughter intervened and I learned to take myself a little less seriously. Thank god we can’t stay Arts students forever. That said it’s still in my top 5! Apologies to Nick and Heather who suggested other Hardy novels, but I just think this would be great for a bunch of book nerds, particularly coming immediately after Chopin’s Awakening.