Set in Russia before its Revolution, Anna Karenina is a true psychological study of not only the Russian people and their society, but societal and personal issues of all mankind. Tolstoy dwells on the "why" -- why do we do as we do and how did we get where we are.

Following the story of a married woman disenchanted by her dull life and marriage who steps out of bounds to seek passion, Anna Karenina shows the effects not only on herself, but on those she left behind and on all those who love her. At the same time, we have a story of the wealthy class versus the laborers, and the faithful versus the faithless and the searching. We have views of the government from the inside and out, of the arts, of philosophers, and of both men and women.

Tolstoy is one of the few authors who can use omniscient POV and still bring us very close to the characters so they feel real to us. I liked the non-judgmental feel, the way the portrait was painted but left for us to interrupt, and the way the meandering thoughts still somehow stayed intact to keep us on track.

Repetition was an issue for me. It could easily have been edited to cut unnecessary scenes and thoughts that had already been given to us, making it shorter in the meantime.

Tolstoy put himself in one of his characters: Levin. While this can be damaging to a novel, in this case, it works well and provides additional insight.

I highly recommend this book. It stresses the distinction between book learning and real life learning, the hypocrisy of doing good works for selfish purposes, and how we overthink instead of trusting our innate senses.