720 pages, 311,596 words later, I find myself wiser. If there are books that men and women should refer to, to make sense of the world and their lives, this is one of them. It is a book of ideas - strong ones - many you will loathe, few you will hold dearest - but they together will help you form a clearer view of the society. As far as the characters go, Dominique is by far the only literary female character I hate and love for the same reasons, and how much! For the rest, Roark and Ellsworth take the cake for being the most interesting characters ever written, and Wynand, the most troubled. 
 Be good to yourself. Read it.