Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
(1847) 359 pages

This classic story is one of the most famous novels in literary history. Before reading this novel, I never expected it to be a romance that gives great insight into life itself. The novel centers around Heathcliff, an orphan who was “adopted” into the rich aristocratic family of the Earnshaws. Heathcliff develops a romance with the Earnshaw’s only daughter, Catherine (Cathy) Earnshaw, who is technically his sister but also not really because he was never officially adopted into the family, and begins a master plan to ascend to the top of the social hierarchy through sometimes evil means. Cathy and Heathcliff spend a long time during their childhoods together, but after a while Cathy decides that Heathcliff is not good enough for her, and marries Edgar Linton, who is technically her cousin, the son of the richest family in town. The story describes love, passion, and loss, showing the two different sides of love with Heathcliff and Cathy’s romance being fiery and passionate, while Edgar and Cathy’s romance being a little colder and calmer. It brings great insight into the type of love people should try and strive for, albeit the best choice being the middle of the two. It is a really great book, and it has so many gut-wrenching romantic lines that are just wonderful. No one can really write the way the authors of olden times did, and this book is just proof of that. There are so many hidden meanings, tropes, and motifs within this novel that makes it such a fun read. It is also very dark, with mentions and descriptions of many violent actions and gory thoughts, but that’s what makes this novel so special. It is the perfect blend of romance and violence, the best of both worlds if you will. While reading this novel, I could not have helped thinking that a lot of recently released books that I have read all have similar tropes to this one, albeit slightly more moderate in characterization and plot points, but it makes me think that a lot of the modern books are somewhat based on this novel.