This was just okay. While Eliot certainly can write, and I liked the insights into human nature and personalities that she included, I didn't particularly like the story or any of the characters.

I felt the author was a bit harsh when it came to the character of Tom, painting him as only terribly selfish and immature, with very little redeeming qualities; when it came to Maggie, she was too merciful, making her out to be a wonderful person even when she acted completely thoughtlessly, just because she "had a good heart." Since I learned this account was somewhat autobiographical for the author, based on her turbulent relationship with her own brother, this made sense, but didn't make for an objective story.

There were multiple love triangles (which always make me roll my eyes), and the ending was very abrupt and ridiculous. It just felt like a cop-out.

However, I did like some of it, and here are a few quotes in particular that struck me:

"...conscientious people are apt to see their duty in that which is the most painful course..." p 587

"There is something sustaining in the very agitation that accompanies the first shocks of trouble, just as an acute pain is often a stimulus, and produces an excitement which is transient strength. It is in the slow, changed life that follows - in the time when sorrow has become stale, and has no longer an emotive intensity that counteracts its pain - in the time when day follows day in dull unexpectant sameness, and trial is a dreary routine - it is then that despair threatens; it is then that the peremptory hunger of the soul is felt, and eye and ear are strained after some unlearned secret of our existence, which shall give to endurance the nature of satisfaction." p 313 ( )

Tom was a heartless, self-righteous ass. Maggie was an insipid sop of a fool, self-righteous in her own way. The one was a mindless roar, the other a detestable whimper. Such wonderful writing, but I ceased caring about any of these hateful characters at least halfway through the book. I had to force myself to finish it. By the end, I was earnestly hoping that Maggie would fling herself into the Floss and make a pleasing end of things for everyone. It isn't hard to imagine how happy I was about the ending, at least, though no auto de fé could suffice to redeem these two obnoxious characters.

Why did you do this to me, George Eliot? I won't soon forgive this offense. ( )

While I immediately disliked the way everyone except her father treated Maggie, I was mildly enjoying this classic about the struggles of a middle class family in Victorian England until the final 2 books (about the final 20%). I found Maggie's behavior in these final sections so intensely irritating that it ruined the book for me.

This is the 3rd George Eliot book I have read & overall I haven't been a fan. Guess I will skip Daniel Deronda and Adam Bede (both on the Guardian's list) at least for the near future!

Nadia May was excellent even though I didn't care for the book & I would recommend her narration. ( )

This novel was Eliot’s follow-up to her successful Adam Bede. While I didn’t feel it was consistently as strong as that book, and my attention wavered at times, I enjoyed it overall. In particular, the crisis that destroys Maggie Tulliver’s reputation while at the same time strengthening her moral conviction, as well as the denouement that followed, swept me along like the raging waters of the Humber (sorry, Floss).
As for what bothered me: I felt the relationship between Maggie and her beloved, implacable brother Tom was too closely modeled on that of Eliot and her brother Isaac, who never reconciled with her after she set up house with George Henry Lewes. And the depiction of Maggie’s four aunts was, to me, overdone; I felt the same effect could have been achieved with fewer pen strokes. In addition, the juxtaposition of satire and pathos pulled the narrative in opposite directions. And the repeated foreshadowing of Maggie’s eventual fate was, to my taste, heavy-handed.
Balanced against that is the lovingly detailed realism of rural life evident in every one of her works I’ve read so far. In addition, there is her characteristic analysis of the dynamics of small-town society. For me, the contrast of the demands of competing modes of “morality” — Christian and societal — in the wake of Maggie’s ordeal is a strong point of the book. The ground had been prepared for it at the midpoint, the opening chapter of Book 4, “A Variation of Protestantism Unknown to Bossuet.” I continue to be struck by Eliot’s “post-anti-evangelicalism,” her sympathetic depiction of a faith she no longer shares. In this book, this is not only embodied by Maggie but also by the local vicar, Dr. Kenn (well-named; he is the one who truly knows).
As a child, Maggie is so impetuous and clumsy that it’s hard to imagine, given her precocious intelligence, that she can’t foresee the consequences of her actions.
This trait of the childhood Maggie returns at the book’s climax, when she awakens to the reality of having allowed herself to be swept away with the tide (literally) in the company of her cousin’s intended, Stephen Guest. At this book’s heart, as in most of Eliot’s work, is the theme of the restricted life chances for women in early nineteenth-century England. Her behavior throughout this episode must be read in the context of the options of a young woman in her time. When so read, it’s clear that alongside her acquiescence to her fate is the fierce struggle to support herself and achieve self-determination. At heart is a profound ethical resolve. ( )

Inspirada en gran parte en los recuerdos de la infancia de George Eliot, que transcurrió en las propiedades paternas de Warwickshire junto a su hermano Isaac, El molino del Floss (1860) gira en torno al desigual destino de Tom y Maggie Tulliver. A pesar de la inteligencia natural de Maggie, es Tom, por ser varón, quien recibe educación y en quien el padre -y por supuesto la sociedad provinciana de mediados del siglo XIX- confía para el futuro del molino. Cuando los niños se acercan a la juventud, la desgracia económica cae sobre la familia, y los hermanos se ven obligados a enfrentarse a las dificultades.