Anna Karenina is Tolstoy's classic tale of love and adultery, set against the backdrop of high society in Moscow and Saint Petersburg, Russia. This cultural clash unfolds in a compelling, emotional drama of seduction, betrayal, and redemption.
The novel charts the disastrous course of a love affair between Anna, a beautiful married woman, and Count Vronsky, a wealthy army officer. Tolstoy seamlessly weaves together the lives of dozens of characters, and in doing so captures a breathtaking tapestry of late-nineteenth-century Russian society. This novel marks a turning point in the author's career, the juncture at which he turned from fiction toward faith.