The Brothers Karamazov took me two attempts across four years. The first attempt stalled in the opening section, which is genealogy and religious argument and apparently unrelated backstory. The second attempt, when I was different enough to understand what Dostoevsky was doing, did not stall.

The novel is about whether a secular morality is possible without God — whether the absence of a divine lawgiver means that everything is permitted. Ivan's argument for moral nihilism in the chapter 'Rebellion' is one of the most rigorously constructed philosophical positions in all fiction, and the 'Grand Inquisitor' section that follows is the most famous challenge to it. Dostoevsky was arguing with himself, and he was honest enough to let Ivan win the argument.

The murder mystery plot is good. The theological argument underneath the murder mystery is the reason the novel has lasted.