A Novel in Four Parts with Epilogue

I finally finished reading "The Brothers Karamazov" on Sunday. It took months to read, because I didn't want to finish reading it. I could have torn through it, but I always had to step away and contemplate. It is the first book I seriously considered reading again from the start once I finished it. I can not explain the merits of this book enough. This is a joyous book that is flowing in suffering. To hold and understand both joy and suffering at the same time has been one of the valued lessons the spirit has led me through these past few months. This book has played its part in the process of wholeness I find myself in, and the fruit of new life.

I have an old, good, friend back in my hometown whose face often appeared in my mind as I read this book. One day in the near future, he is going to receive a surprise package in the mail with a note attached to it that goes something like this:

Dear ______,

Just under a year ago I found this book in a used bookstore and felt compelled to buy it. Read it I did, and my heart burned. I speak truthfully when I say the voice of God was heard as pages turned, and the hero Alyosha navigated the world his beloved Zosima sent him into. From early on I knew I needed to send you this book, purely as an response to a burning heart that I'm still learning to acknowledge. So read this treasure, my friend, and as you finish I hope you will speak the novice's penultimate words with me: "Certainly we shall rise, certainly we shall see and gladly, joyfully tell one another all that has been."

Until that day,

Dave

This is a masterpiece. Even LOST Season 2 thinks so...