Anna Karenina or War and Peace?

[JimmyRow]

I just finished reading "A Hero of Our Time" by Mikhail Lermontov, and am ready to paddle through some Tolstoy. If I was to only read one book by him (which will hopefully not be the case), what should it be?

[B-Mental]

Between the two options you pointed out...I prefer War & Peace. I've read it twice. Then again as a male I just couldn't get into the titular heroine Anna. You could try something shorter, maybe 'The Death of Ivan Illyich'.

[prendrelemick]

War and peace by a country mile.

[bazarov]

Anna Karenina - you will like it a lot and then you'll look for War and Peace. I am male and I really can't...spoiler :D

[prendrelemick]

Oh dear, Three replies and three different answers

[B-Mental]

Actually, I do believe it is two for War & Peace, and one for Anna Karenina.

[eyemaker]

The former. I read both and loved them both. But I'll have to vote for "AnnaK".:)
--oh by the way-i'm male

[mona amon]

I think it doesn't really matter. They're both easy to get into, and when you've read one you'll probably want to read the other. Of course, War and Peace is BIG! :) I think I like it better than Anna Karenina.

[JimmyRow]

Thanks everyone. I figured I couldn't go wrong either way, but was curious if there was an obvious choice. I guess not. I got War and Peace out of the library last night. I wonder how many times you can renew a book...

[bazarov]

I guess you will find out.