I found this copy in the clearance section at Half Price Books and decided to plunge into the 450 pages of extremely small print.
Alexandre Dumas was a prolific writer with an interesting past (he was once a scribe to duc d'Orleans who became King Louise Philippe). At the height of his career, in Le Port-Marly, he built Chateau de Monte-Cristo along with another building as a writing study which he named Chateau d'If. The property is now a historic museum.
The story begins during the time that Napoleon Bonapart was exiled to the island of Elba and those who fought for Napoleon were being persecuted. (Napoleon later raised an army and became emperor of France once again for a mere 100 days). During this time, two jealous men who knew Edmond Dantes was innocently given the task of delivering a letter to a Bonapartist, used the information to have him arrested. He was imprisoned at the Chateau d'If where he met a priest who gave him the means to exact his revenge. The main theme running through The Count of Monte Cristo is that of revenge and cunning and the Count/Dantes has many aliases as do many of the characters which can be confusing. Also, some of the characters have titles and they are referred to by these rather than their name. To help to keep them straight look at the Cliff Notes Character List which explains each character and the names used for them.
Despite the time this was written, it is still a gripping story.
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| Chateau d'If prison (if means yew in English) |
