Histoire d'un casse-noisette vs À rebours: Which Should You Read?
Both live on shelves: Translations from French, French fiction
Histoire d'un casse-noisette
A little girl's devotion to her Christmas nutcracker is instrumental in breaking a spell imposed upon the nutcracker-prince by his enemies, the mice.
1 film adaptation
vs
À rebours
À rebours (French pronunciation: [a ʁ(ə).buʁ]; translated Against Nature or Against the Grain) is an 1884 novel by the French writer Joris-Karl Huysmans. The narrative centers on a single character: Jean des Esseintes,…
The verdict
- Ratings are close across the board — any is a safe pick by score.
- Histoire d'un casse-noisette is the quickest read — about 3 hours vs 5 for À rebours.
- À rebours has the widest readership — 15820 ratings behind its score.
How to choose
Scores by source
| Histoire d'un casse-noisette | À rebours | |
|---|---|---|
| Goodreads | 3.7 (3853) | 3.8 (15820) |
| Hardcover | — | 5.0 (1) |
Reception
| Histoire d'un casse-noisette | À rebours | |
|---|---|---|
| Ratings | 3853 | 15820 |
| Editions | 42 | 337 |
| Film adaptations | 1 | 1 |
| Want to read | 5067 | 36162 |
| Reading it now | 222 | — |
| Written reviews | 567 | 1515 |
| Wikipedia attention | 5121 | 6192 |
| Pages | 185 | 294 |