A Personal Review of Frankenstein: The Story Most People Get Wrong

I’ve read Frankenstein more times than I can count. It’s one of my all-time favorite novels, and every rereading reminds me how often people think they know the story—but really don’t.

Even the book’s origin is remarkable. Mary Shelley was only 19 when she wrote it during the famous ghost-story challenge of 1816; it was published in 1818. Some early critics tried to credit her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, instead. But the empathy, structure, and insight are unmistakably hers.

And while a few film versions come closer than others, no adaptation captures the novel’s depth. As with most classics, reading it yourself matters.

Because Frankenstein isn’t really about the monster most people imagine.

It’s about Victor Frankenstein, a scientist who creates life and then abandons it. The “monster,” whom I prefer to call the creation, begins as a blank slate. He learns language by listening, kindness by observing, and morality through reading. He longs for friendship, for love, for belonging.

He pleads with his maker:

“I ought to be thy Adam; but I am rather the fallen angel.”

And later he explains,

“I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend.”

That’s the heart of the novel. The real horror isn’t lightning bolts or stitched flesh—it’s neglect, rejection, and fear of the unfamiliar. The creation doesn’t start as a monster. He becomes one after being judged, attacked, and denied compassion.

That idea has stayed with me for years—so much that I have the creation tattooed on my arm as a reminder.

Not as a statement about others, but about myself.

Like anyone who works in public, I’ve had my share of criticism and detractors here in Loveland. That comes with caring about a community and putting ideas out into the world. Reading Shelley helps me remember not to let frustration or resentment take root. It’s easy to respond to harsh words with harshness of your own. But that’s how bitterness grows—and Shelley’s novel is a warning about what happens when it does.

The creation wanted something simple:

“Live, and be happy, and make others so.”

That line feels like the real lesson of Frankenstein. Not a story about monsters, but about responsibility, empathy, and the choices we make when we feel misunderstood.

People still call the book one of the first horror novels. Maybe that’s true. But its deepest fear isn’t of science or monsters—it’s of what happens when we stop seeing each other as human, and bringing out the worst in others.

That’s why I keep returning to this book. And why the creation is on my arm—not as a badge of grievance, but as a reminder to stay kind, stay steady, and try, as Shelley wrote, to live in a way that makes others happy too. To remember to take the High Road as much as I can -and not become a monster, nor create them.