Turn, pause, look back and wave - Rated 
Tom Brown's Schooldays is part novel, part education theory, but it is a great read. It is true that boys these days are unlikely to incur the wrath of their friends for not recognising a beech tree on sight, and that particular incident highlights the difference between the world described and the world as we know it. Despite this, it does not present an unrecognisable world and it actually allows us to look back on a time and a tradition long gone from modern Britain, and to smile at the innocence of children in the Victorian Era. The characters are what keeps the novel alive. To watch Tom grow from young boy to troublemaker to responsible, caring young man ready for Oxford, is a moving experience. The cast of characters around him ensure that he gets into all sorts of scrapes along the way, and the portrait painted of the great Dr. Thomas Arnold is one of a very intelligent, strong, yet caring man who quietly goes about the business of turning Tom into a young man worthy of praise. It is true that this book contains possibly the worst opening chapter in all of English literature, but get past that and you'll discover something quite special.
Great - Rated
Jeeze louise, after taking more than three weeks to mull over the first hundered pages of this at times hard going but brilliant book i finished the following two hundered in about a day and a half as i found it truly 'can't put it down' style reading . At times the novel was beautiful, touching, whilst at the same time a brilliant effective guide for not just contempary but also modern day youths on how to conduct themselves and behave like gentlemen . The book was like a sermon with enough charm not to seem overbearing and with enough mischief to make an entertaining coming of age tale . Apart from the ridicioulsly slow and stogy opening the rest of the tale was told with such charm and charisma that although the book is not one of my dearest, I developed a keen interest in the characters and wantend to read on and on soley for the purpose of seeing them develop . The characters and the way they behaved and changed was superbly identifiable and satisfying and for that reason i was mildly dissapointed with the novels ending . I have discovered that the is a little known sequal to this called 'tom brown at oxford'
Historically fascinating - Rated
I first tried to read this when I was 12 and found it very heavy going. Several attempts later, I managed it all the way through and was very glad I did. The glimpses of lost England it gives are fascinating and anyone skipping the first chapter misses so much legend and history. I grew up in this area of Berkshire (now Oxfordshire) and found this chapter very interesting.
Yes, it is sentimental, but you have to remember the time in which it was written. It is probably the first ever school story written and one of the first fiction books for children that aimed at entertaining rather than merely lecturing.
Nauseatingly sentimental at times but an essential reference - Rated
Ignore the first chapter which is one of the worst written book openings ever. The rest of the book describes in incredibly sentimental terms a young boy's education at Rugby. The boy's adventures are compelling not least to have an idea of what an English Public school was in the early 1800s. The best part however, concerns the fabulous character that Thomas Hughes created in the bully Flashman. You need to have read this book to fully appreciate the genius of the Flashman Papers subsequently written by George MacDonald Fraser. Thomas Hughes' book is seminal work and must be viewed as a great reference book.
Entertaining - Rated 
Despite a somewhat cloying sentimentality I enjoyed this book and found it amusing and touching. Flashman is a wonderfully despicable character, in fact probably more palatable than Tom Brown who can be a bit of a weed at times. It is interesting to read as a forerunner to "Stalky & Co." By Rudyard Kipling which is a vast improvement on the same theme and of course "Molesworth" who is the epitome of all schoolboy heroes! Good background material.
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