First Impression Friday will be a meme where you talk about a book that you JUST STARTED! Maybe you’re only a chapter or two in, maybe a little farther. Based on this sampling of your current read, give a few impressions and predict what you’ll think by the end.

Synopsis:

Like most of Hardy’s novels, The Mayor of Casterbridge is a powerful and harsh study of characters defeated in their struggle with the physical and social environment, victims of their own impulses as well as capricious chance. While drunk, unemployed Michael Henchard sells his wife and daughter at a country fair to a sailor. His remorse leads him to forsake drinking and embark on a fruitless 18-year search for family. When a reunion at last occurs, it is marked by deception and tragedy.

It’s the end of the workweek—yay! Technically, it is already Saturday. I hope the week has been kind to everyone, although the previous week was quite hectic for me personally. A lot of issues arose, and I tried to manage all of them. Still, I can’t believe how time flies! We are inching closer to the year’s midpoint. In a couple of days, we will be welcoming the year’s seventh month. Time takes its natural course. Nevertheless, I hope the first half of the year has been promising. I hope the conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere in the world continue to de-escalate—or, better yet, are resolved altogether. As the year progresses, I hope everyone is given plenty of opportunities to grow and improve. With the weekend here, I hope everyone has a great one. It’s time to dress down and spend it either resting from the rigors of a demanding career, pursuing passions, completing household chores, spending time with loved ones, or simply relaxing. I hope you’re all doing well—physically, mentally, and emotionally.

I was supposed to wrap up my three-month venture into European literature in May. However, I realized that I had yet to read the works of several European writers included in my reading challenges. This is rather ironic because the primary reason I started reading works by European writers this early was to tackle the books I had already listed for those challenges. I usually read such works later in the year. I initially thought this extension would be brief, but upon reviewing my reading challenges, I realized I might spend more time here than planned. Thankfully, I am finally down to the last book by a European writer from these challenges. Yesterday, I completed M.M. Kaye’s The Far Pavilions. Today, I started reading the last work by a British writer on these challenges. It seems that I am on track to finish them before June ends.

Interestingly, my venture into European literature has centered around two major ethnolinguistic groups: French and British/English. With all the works by French writers on my reading challenges completed, I am concluding my journey with the last two works by British writers on those challenges. The second of these is Thomas Hardy’s The Mayor of Casterbridge. Like most of the writers whose oeuvres I have been exploring over the past decade or so, it was through must-read lists that I was first introduced to the British writer, although I may have actually encountered him earlier and simply dismissed him. I would eventually come across him again when I decided to expand my reading horizons. Several of his works appeared on must-read lists and were even considered literary classics. This piqued my interest, and I have since read two of his novels: Tess of the d’Urbervilles (1891) and Far from the Madding Crowd (1874). This makes The Mayor of Casterbridge the third Hardy novel I have read.

Actually, I acquired a copy of the novel in 2019, even before the pandemic. However, it suffered the same fate as most of my books: gathering dust on my bookshelf. This prompted me to include it in my 2026 Beat the Backlist Challenge. Originally published as The Mayor of Casterbridge: The Life and Death of a Man of Character, the novel was first serialized weekly beginning in January 1886. The story commences on a September day in the 1820s when the Henchard family arrives on foot at the village of Weydon-Priors. The patriarch, Michael, is seeking work as a hay-trusser. Along with his wife, Susan, and their daughter, Elizabeth-Jane, the family stops for food at the furmity tent at the local fair. Michael is served alcohol by the furmity-woman. As he becomes increasingly drunk, he loudly confesses his unhappiness with his wife and his foolish decision to marry young.

The story takes a sinister turn when a rash statement, meant as a half-joke, is taken seriously. He decides to auction off his wife and daughter to any other man. A sailor named Richard Newson appears in the doorway and offers five guineas for Susan and Elizabeth-Jane. Left with no recourse, Susan and Elizabeth-Jane leave with Newson. Before she departs, however, Susan angrily tells her husband that she will try to find happiness with a different man. Henchard, in his drunken state, is bewildered by the outcome of the events. He falls asleep, and when he wakes the next morning, he regrets what he has done. He searches the town for his wife and daughter but is unable to find them. He then goes to a church and swears that he will not drink alcohol for twenty-one years, the same number of years he has been alive.

Eighteen years later, Newson is lost at sea, leaving Susan and Elizabeth-Jane without support. Susan had lived as Newson’s wife. Mother and daughter then set out to seek out Henchard for support, although Elizabeth-Jane believes they are looking for a long-lost relative. They soon arrive in the titular town of Casterbridge, where they learn that Henchard has become the mayor. Susan and Michael meet and plot their next move. They do not want their daughter to know about their disgrace. As such, they agree that Michael will court and remarry Susan as though they had only recently met. The premise itself is quite interesting. I must say that each of the three Hardy novels I have read so far is distinct in its own way. They also share the quality of being character-centric. The Mayor of Casterbridge is, I surmise, about the trials and tribulations of Michael Henchard.

I am just a quarter of the way through the book. Susan and Elizabeth-Jane are slowly immersing themselves in their new world. With Susan and Michael finally reunited, will the wounds of the past begin to heal? How will the secrets of the past affect their daughter? During the intervening years, how has Michael changed? Several questions have begun to surface, and I can’t wait for the story to unfold. There also seem to be romantic undertones, as Elizabeth-Jane is gradually attracting the interest of the young men in the town. I still have a long way to go, but I am looking forward to seeing how the story develops. How about you, reader? What book—or books—are you taking with you this weekend? I hope you all have a great one and that whatever you’re reading provides a welcome respite from the demands of daily life.