Bleak House

I just stayed up past midnight to finish Bleak House by Charles Dickens. I haven't done that in a while. I had been thoroughly enjoying the book, but then it got even more suspenseful and good and I had to finish it. This is supposed to be the first book with a detective in it and you could see a lot of the themes that future detective novels would follow. There were a lot of memorable characters, and several that were so well written that they deserve to be as well know as Scrooge and Tiny Tim. I have known some real life people that treat money like Richard Carstone and people that love conflict like Mr. Boythorn. Mr. Voles and Mr. Tulkinghorn were great lawyer stereotypes and antagonists. I loved Esther Summerson's narrative and her good nature. (As a side note, I hate the modern idea that a literary or movie character has to be evil or stupid, and that a moral character is unreal and unlikeable.) Overall, I thought this was as good as or better than Great Expectations and I would recommend it.