This and all other G.Mac books are great stories of the gospel lived out in peoples' lives. My favorite author.

I read this book this summer. It seemed to start off slow in the beginning but by the end I was quite interested in the story.

I throughly enjoyed this book. MacDonald creates a beautiful story of the journey of a poor tutor searching for truth and finding it in God. The tutor's heart changes and with it his whole view of the world and true love.

Romantic and inspiring, of course it's a George MacDonald!

MacDonald is such an interesting author! This story had some strange twists, but was overall enjoyable.

It is always a pleasure to be reminded of just how deep and pure God's love is for us.

As always, George MacDonald is inspiring. The two characters, David Elginbrod and his daughter Margaret, are such powerful examples of Christianity in everyday life.

I liked how MacDonald was able to capture some of the weaknesses in his other characters as well. Euphra is proud and easily manipulated. Mr. Arnold embodies "manliness." The Appleditches are outward Christians, but look down on the poor and care more about their bank account balances than anything else. Very good character sketches all around.

Something unique too is the twist of spiritualism. We in the 21st century can be unfamiliar with the preoccupation with ghosts and spirits that went on back then-- funny, I just finished reading "Wayward Saints" that dealt with this very phenomena in Utah at about the same time period.

A few favorite quotes:

"Does God draw no lines, then?" "When he does, they are pure lines, without breadth, and consequently invisible to moretal eyes; not Chinese walls of separation, such as these definers would construct."

"I say, Euphra! Wasn't that a shame? They would have Jesus as bad as themselves. We shall have somebody writing a book next to prove that after all Jesus was a Pharisee."

I have been all but absorbed in George MacDonald's non-fanciful novels for the past several months. This is the first of the Michael Phillips edited versions that I've read. I was wary of them to begin with, but I found this volume at a thrift store and decided to give it a go. Mr. Phillips' edition obviously made for a quicker, lighter read, but there was little of the luster and richness to which I've grown accustomed in George MacDonald's other wonderful works. Alas! Lesson learned. I will stick with the untouched originals from here on.

Hard to digest with the old language, much better if you hear it read. but a great story.

I loved this book. It had been a while since I had read a book by MacDonald and now I remember why I enjoy his stories so much.