I probably read The Mists of Avalon 26 times when I was a teenager. Between it and Gone With the Wind its hard to say which I read more, but in both I found something of the epic (and the romance). (While I haven’t tried to reread The Mists of Avalon, I did attempt to read GWTW again in my twenties and was aghast at the racism and had to stop. A post for another time is the particular feeling of re-reading a book from childhood only to discover you have so changed).
So when I saw the description of Lev Grossman’s The Bright Sword as an epic to rival that of The Mists, I eagerly picked it up – undaunted or swayed by the mighty thousand pages. And I did enjoy the first 700 enough that I kept going. But eventually the slog got me. The epic quest too much for this failed knight. The weight of the journey too much to bear. Etc repeat.
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Literary Vice 