I am really disturbed by your review saying to "ignore disgruntled English students that have Dickens prodded into them by the school system." How do you know that those students didn't try to like the book? Perhaps they couldn't understand because they had an incompetent teacher. And you also say "Without their reviews, A Tale of Two Cities would have a five star rating." Look at other reviews. Are they they only ones who don't give this a review that dosen't have 5 stars. It dosen't matter if you have been an English teacher for 45 years with 2 PH.D's in the subject, please get your facts straight before you go posting that every single teenager is a lazy, unintelligent punk not interested in school. This is a great book, however. Worth buying if you've got the Cliffs Notes.