Honestly, there's no mainline, just many subplots braided like garlic.

I have to give Eliot props for meticulously constructing "provincial life" in exacting - sometimes excruciating - detail, yet always with a light hand. The various plots deal with all the circumstances listed on the tin. The characters seem at turns real enough to step off the page and too stiff to bend with the paper they're printed on.

Did I like it? No. I read it as part of my read a classic a month goal for 2023. I wanted to see what this book was about and to study the story structure and Eliot's technique.

Did I learn anything? I don't know. Maybe. The style and tone, the loose relationship with the reader that he shares with Melville's Moby Dick. The use of recurring themes in different subplots - sometimes each looking at the same circumstance from an opposing perspective.

Recommended - But

Set aside some time for this one. It's rare for me to need more than 2 days for a novel. This one took over eight.