Rating: 
Summary: Touching story, adorable main character
Review: This is the first story that has been able to touch my "heart". The touching and heartbreakingly-ended relationship between the young girl Florence Dombey (the main character who was 7 years old in the beginning of the story and around 20 in the end) and her little brother Paul Dombey Jr. left me sleepless for many nights. Florence Dombey's eventual winning of her unaffectionate father's heart made me quite joyful, though I was still haunted and saddened by the earlier parts of the book.Moreover, Florence Dombey's affection for all who were kind to her has made me fall in love with her. I wish she could come to life, travel through time into the 21st century, and become my adopted sister. Oh, Floy, how I love you, how I love you, dear Floy! ("Floy" is Florence's nickname) I would definitely recommend this book to all who have a "heart", or more scientifically, a region in the brain that is sensitive and receptive to love and affection.
Rating:
Summary: one of dickens' best
Review: this novel, sitting as it does between dickens' early and late novels, captures the best of both dickens. it has the humor, grotesque characters, and melodrama that characterized the early novels, but it isn't without the unified structure, mature style, and psychological depth that were the hallmarks of his later books. it's one of my favorite dickens books (i've read 11 of them), and if it weren't for the length i'd recommend dombey as the place to start for someone looking to read chas. if 900 pages doesn't faze you then by all means dive in. if it does, then start with 'great expecations' instead. but be sure to come back to dombey. you won't be disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: A Very Good Place To Start
Review: Upon finishing Dombey and Son this morning, I thought back to the first Dickens work I ever read, which was David Copperfield, as a freshman in high school. Since then I have read many others, all with the same extensive cast of characters, side plots, etc.....
Except this one....which makes me question why it is not used as an introduction to the works of Dickens in school curriculums.
Dombey and Son, as a title, refers to the business which provides wealth, title, and position to Mr. Dombey, the aforementioned father. The 'son' refers to a succession of partners in that business, as well as an arrival at the opening of the book, which leads to the demise of Mrs. Dombey. But little Paul Dombey, sharing in his father's first and last names, joins an already present sibling in the world, his sister Florence.
Through the course of the novel, you realize that Dombey and Daughter are really the focus of this story....the fortunes and misfortunes that befall them both, the grievous neglect of one for the other, despite the efforts of the one neglected to reconcile...and a host of others that enter and exit from their lives.
But to recapture and jusitfy my initial point, this book is a marvelous starting point to read Dickens. It is far easier to keep track of the cast of the story, as it is more limited than other Dickens novels, while sharing the same length as most others. The story lines all really do feed into the central plot, and while the 'comedy' that I so enjoy in Dickens's prose is, admittedly, more limited here...it still is a highly enjoyable tale, and a great place to get your feet wet with one of history's best tale-weavers.
Although bittersweet and melancholy in tone, for the majority of the story, Dombey and Son holds up with Dickens's other novels as a true classic.
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