The Story of Edgar Sawtelle
Published 2008 · 566 pages · 155,650 words · about 10 hours at an average pace · Literary Fiction, Coming-of-Age, Mystery & Crime
How hard is The Story of Edgar Sawtelle to read?
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle scores 41 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it moderately challenging. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 38 out of 100
- Wroblewski writes clear, lyrical prose with kennel and dog-training terms and natural description. It is more accessible than The Road's spare lyricism and well below literary heavyweights.
- Sentence structure: 42 out of 100
- Sentences run long and flowing in the nature passages but stay readable. The prose is closer to The Remains of the Day in clarity than to Faulkner.
- Abstraction: 42 out of 100
- Events are concrete: dogs, farm work, weather, a death and a flight. Ideas about communication and loyalty sit beneath the surface, near To Kill a Mockingbird in grounding.
- Information density: 45 out of 100
- The novel is long and absorbs the reader in detailed kennel craft, family history and seasons, but it moves at a measured pace. It is richer than a thriller yet lighter than Moby-Dick.
- Narrative indirection: 50 out of 100
- Edgar's muteness, the dogs' perspectives and the ghost scenes ask readers to infer much about the death and Claude's guilt. The Hamlet frame gives readers a guide.
- Symbolic density: 55 out of 100
- The dogs, Edgar's silence and the ghostly father carry meaning, and the Hamlet structure supplies allegorical echoes. The symbolism is clearer than in The Great Gatsby's set of motifs.
- Ironic distance: 22 out of 100
- The tone is earnest and emotionally direct, with little satire or unreliable narration. It sits near Flights in sincerity.
- Resolution withholding: 40 out of 100
- The plot reaches a definite climax, but the ending leaves emotional and moral questions and is deliberately bittersweet. It closes more firmly than Lolita but ambiguity lingers.
- Structural complexity: 38 out of 100
- The story is mostly linear, with shifts to the dogs' viewpoints and a mid-book flight into the wilderness. It is more intricate than Beach Read and simpler than The Master and Margarita.
How The Story of Edgar Sawtelle is regarded
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle holds a literary regard score of 38 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.