I remember the day, a couple of months back when in one of my visits to forum's landmark, I was as usual browsing throught the classics section and I happened to notice this book. I picked it up to confirm that it was the un-abriged version, which it was, and I just bought it. Simple, didn't even see the reviews or previews. I had been hearing about this book a lot and voila, now Ive got it! After 2 months and 2 books read in-between, I got to find out what it is all about.

This is a tragic story of a beautiful girl, who was loved to the brink by 2 persons, one an old priest - who was the cause of her death, a murderer - and the other a ugly hunchbacked bellringer - who was even willing to get her a lover just to see her happy. She in her turn was in love with an army man, who being handsome and "of the society", looked at her - a nomad - as an object to be used for pleasure but nothing else. The story is about the tragic death of the 3 lovers and the good life of the 'society man'. It very vividly show the insanity of the European people of those times towards people from other parts of the world (I still believe this exists but may be to a slightly lesser extent) and of the recklessness of the kings (read today's politicians).

It was a good read, specially after the initial half! The first half is a little too slow but it gets exciting after a point of time. Go on, get yourself this book.