Les Mis or Le Miss?

I'm laughing so hard right my sides are aching. See, I have this good friend (my adopted aunt, really) who swore she was never going to touch Les Misérables on account of how... miserable it was (and who will be quite horrified to see this journal entry, because she stalks me here, apparently), and who would never have even picked up the book had I not dumped it in her lap.

On 18 November she wrote:

I'm reading Les Miserables. Kill me now. [faint]

On 19 November it was:

Now that I'm reading this, which still evades as to 'why', I figure I will keep an update on where I am in the book.

Just three days later this appeared:

Where do I start? Let me just say that, believe it or not, I actually enjoyed Book One. No, it was not real exciting and I actually was quite bored with it initially but the very end of that part grabbed me. Not that it was a page turner, it definitely wasn't, but in the aspect that I think I would have enjoyed meeting that man.

And then on 3 December:

Valjean [...] Well, it happened, I love this character. [...] I feel I may be doing what I promised myself I wouldn't do, I want to draw Valjean...

And then there was this on 14 December:

I couldn't wait...I watched Les Miserable, the musical. I'm sorry, I could. Not. Help. Myself. My niece happened to mention she had it and well, the rest is history. Yes. I liked it.
So now I'm desperate to finish the book. [yes, let's highlight that]
I wish I could sing because I love everything Eponine sings, also Fantine.

And the very next day:

I'm not a history buff, far from it, but I admit that sometimes reading/watching stories will get yearning for some history. In short, the movies The Scarlet Pimpernel and The Count of Monte Cristo, along with the Les Miserables book are making me need to learn more about the Revolutionary, French Revolution, whatever you want to call it. I have been BEGGING all my literary friends to let me know of a book, biography or not, about Napoleon but none have been able to offer me anything.

Let me put it this way, if anyone knows of a good book, I would ask for an easy read but I know that won't be possible, that can give me a nice picture of everything that happened I would appreciate it.

I will also state that this could be in the form of a fiction movie/novel. I, in fact, learned all about the civil war from a miniseries called The North And The South. Seriously. I liked the miniseries enough to make me google for additional information. Now I know Les Mis has some war history in it but, honestly, I kind got lost there. :\ It was beautifully written but I could not keep anything straight, I swear some information changed. ROFL. I know, it didn't, but it was a little hard for me. BUT SOMEONE NEEDS TO DRAW A MAP ABOUT THAT AREA! Seriously. I was thinking of doing a topographical one but that would only do SO much, it really needs some pop out maps with better detail, at least of the significant places.

I couldn't help but chuckle my way through the chronicles of her progress. Doubtless I shall be killed for posting this, but I could always come back as a zombie.

Houston, we have a convert. I told you so, TankMagnet. ;-)