This book is was definitely not my favorite, but it wasn't the worst ever either. I actually liked Briony as a character at first, until she committed "the crime" that caused so much controversy in many people's lives, and caused guilt and regret in Briony's own life. I enjoyed the parts of the book during the war...I felt the descriptions were realistic and in some parts gruesome, but that made the images and feeling of how war really is so much more real. (view spoiler)[The book really made me think about things in the context of which crime was worse? Was the rape of a young teenage girl by a man that the raped girl eventually goes on to marry worse? Or was the lie by the young 13 year old cousin of the raped girl that put an innocent man behind bars for many years before he got out to fight in World War II worse? A brutal rape is a terrible, terrible thing and is in no way condoned by me...so I feel it is an offense that should be punished. However, a lie perpetrated against an innocent man that upends his entire way of life is in its own way a horrendous crime, and something that should not happen, but does happen quite often in the world we live in. (hide spoiler)]