Reading the Story of O

I read on someone's blog this afternoon that one of her training tasks was to re-read "The Story of O".  This is not something I would want any sub or wife of mine to read.  It's a story of abuse, abandonment and desolation and has little literary value, and is an example of how NOT to live, how NOT to care for someone.  I certainly would not ask my wife to read it, and if I did and she started, I think she would soon give it up, probably wondering why on earth I suggested it.

If I were to give someone a reading task, it would be a book with broad human values depicted.  Depending on the woman and her educational level, I might choose Anne of Green Gables,  The Secret Garden,  Sense and Sensibility,  The Alchemist,  Doctor Zhivago,  Silas Marner,  Kim, Great Expectations,  even Madame Bovary or Jane Eyre.

The reason these classics are still widely read is that they deal fairly with universal human doings and feelings.  Many of them I have read to my son (I have read to Claude more than 40 substantial books and uncounted short stories, fairy stories etc since he was 4 years old) and as a result he has a very wide vocabulary and an acquaintance with a little of the worlds great literature.  This is the kind of reading I would ask a sub to do, because I know that after she has finished such a book, she will be wiser, and perhaps happier.

What would be the recommendations of others here?