Could this be your August of discontent, where you find your husband dull, your life provincial and lacking in excitement? Do you suffer from delusions of love fixing your existence? Do you need to fill a "forbidden book" on your BINGO card? Is this the time to revive your rusty French? Do you just love Flaubert, a writer's writer, who took a whole year to write 90 pages of this oeuvre? Does your beach read demand a Second Empire novel? Did you regret not reading this back in 2017?

Well, fear not, it's time to (again) meet Emma Bovary in Gustave Flaubert's masterpiece, Madame Bovary.

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Madame Bovary is the debut novel of French writer Gustave Flaubert, published in 1856. The character lives beyond her means in order to escape the banalities and emptiness of provincial life. When the novel was first serialized in La Revue de Paris between 1 October 1856 and 15 December 1856, public prosecutors attacked the novel for obscenity. The resulting trial in January 1857 made the story notorious. After Flaubert's acquittal on 7 February 1857, Madame Bovary became a bestseller in April 1857 when it was published in two volumes. A seminal work of literary realism, the novel is now considered Flaubert's masterpiece, and one of the most influential literary works in history. (link)

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We will be meeting here, in r/bookclub on Fridays this August to discuss, amaze and scandalize each other on the following dates, with the following chapters:

August 5, Section I, Chapters 1-9

August 12, Section II, Chapters 1-9

August 19, Part II: Chapters 10-15, Part III: Chapters 1-3

August 26, Part III: Chapters 10-15

This will be a book in translation (unless you're reading it in French with us), so you can find some options and more information in Marginalia, along with a bunch of other stuff and possible SPOILERS!

I am tellement ravie!