Will the misery ever end?

Once again I am having another bash at getting Les Mis finished. Everytime that I think that there can't be much more left to go it seems like another hundred pages are sneaked in at the back. It's not that I am not enjoying this book, it's just that, in my opinion, it wouldn't hurt if it was a little bit shorter. 

Also characters seem to be dropping like flies, and I was most unimpressed when my favourite character was mown down in the character killing frenzy that seems to be happening. At this rate, by the end of the book there won't be any characters left. I don't want to appoint a new favourite character just in case they too become victim to Hugo's murderous pen. There is only so much that I can emotionally invest in one book.

I think the most disturbing part of the book I have read so far was about the Parisian sewers. They were detailed, with perhaps a little too much detail. EG says that I could have avoided them if I had chosen to read the abridged version instead. But that just doesn't sounds as cool to me. If I'm going to conquer a book I want to do it properly.

No doubt my evenings this week will be spent in front of the fire plowing on through the never ending book that is Les Mis.