I read about half of Juliette about 20 years ago. It's a long, repetitive book so please forgive me for abandoning it! C…I read about half of Juliette about 20 years ago. It's a long, repetitive book so please forgive me for abandoning it! Can I give four stars to a book that I abandoned? Four stars for a book that I've described as repetitive? Yes, I can...it's flawed but astonishing.Although I'm sure that there are people somewhere who would consider de Sade a lightweight, I'm also sure that 99.99% of the population would consider it pretty intense. For example I remember getting to the point where de Sade had concocted a scene where there was a row of women with babies on their shoulders, the children were then stabbed and the blood ran down the women's backs who defecated at this point so that a row of kneeling men ate the blood/faeces mixture. Knowing de Sade the men were probably masturbating and/or being sodomised at the same time - 'Good Grief!!!' I remember getting to this point of the book feeling desensitised and numb and decided to stop.It's the unrelenting monotony of de Sade's sexual visions and scenarios that had me in the end. They should be described as foul and depraved rather than as erotic as they focus so much on shit, piss, blood and vomit and the sex isn't kinky, it's extreme and painfully violent. I think I felt sick most of the time rather than aroused. Though if you're into pain and body fluids you'll probably find it titillating.Between the sexual perversions, when the libertines are relaxing and eating, there are usually passages in which the characters voice de Sade's political and philosophical views. These actually became more interesting than the monotonous sexual acts and de Sade comes across as a forerunner to Nietzsche - opposed to religion and in favour of man taking control of his own destiny.Everyone should read some Sade at some point as it's truly …