Memoirs of a Madman deals with a 17 year old Flaubert's confusion as he falls in love with a woman he sees at the beach, and how the thoughts of her take over from the deep thinking he had always done during his whole life previously. Sounds interesting, you say? It definitely would be if he werent spending the duration of the book writing paragraphs and paragraphs based on the same feelings. We have to remember that this book was written for a friend, and most likely made much more sense to the friend who actually knew him personally. We, however, do not.

If you are writing a thesis on Flaubert, I would say this is essential reading, but if you're looking for a good story or a good piece of literature, you'll find many better places. It's almost impossible to believe that this is the same person who wrote Madame Bovary, one of the top-10 pieces of literature ever written.