Hector Malot

It's quite a long coming of age story about a boy who is a street musician in France, with many twists and turns. While the way it is written in has a certain beauty, it lacks directness. Maybe this is because the story is old and written for a different audience than today. A lot of adventurous / emotional things happen, but you don't always experience it as such. Still the story is beautiful, but it requires quite some determination to sit through and enjoy it.