Ken Follett: The Pillars Of The Earth

[ions]

I liked the book. Contrary to Rogue I found the characters actions believable except for one sex scene. Just seemed rushed. He could have drawn out the tension a little better and not rushed the plot.

I'm talking about the scene where Tom Builder and the chick screw the morning after Tom Builder's wife kicks the bucket. Too much too soon. Yeah they're intense in their feelings but c'mon. The man just finished throwing dirt on his dead wife and abandoned the child she died squirting out. Yeah, sounds like the perfect time for a quick romp with a stranger.

Prose was decent and easy. Not overly pretty but simple, clean and fast reading. The research put into it seemed accurate to my limited knowledge. I cared about the characters enough to stay interested all through the 900+ pages. My biggest complaint was that there was some repetition that I could have done without. Was like he was providing recaps in case I hadn't picked up the book for weeks between chapters. Unless you were likely to find the plot and setting interesting I wouldn't recommend it heartedly. No matter how much Follet complains that book shouldn't be up for literary rewards. It's good, but not award winning good.

[pontalba]

Originally Posted by ions

While we're on the topic of this book I thought I would post this:



Found here.

Thanks so much for posting that link! I read Pillars many years ago, and actually re-read it for this discussion..........then Hurricane Katrina put out our lights, and the phone. See what happens when I actually Plan for a discussion!

Just got our phone service back day before yesterday. But we are among the more fortunate. Really. We were too far north to get flooded.

BTW, Pillars is one of my favorite of Follett's, along with Eye of the Needle.

[angelmav]

I enjoyed this book immensely, in fact I joined this forum because I was searching further information on this book and it led me here. Before I give my opinion let me preface my comments by saying I love the old cathedrals and it is one of my favorite things to explore (I am stationed in Germany so it gives me ample opporunity). That said I just completd the book and was captivated from start to finish. The images he creates are believable and draw you in, the characters seem real and considering the time period I feel he pushed the limits as far as making them both dynamic and believable. Again I see where some comment on the role of wome being sunserviant (well for the time they were) but he also makes them major players and equals, Aliena in fact is a character who is not only a better businessperson than the other male characters, she is a much more capable leader. The fact that woman were vulnarable is simple an accuracy of the period. The villans are not only well drawn, but he shows how they come to make their choices and what leads them down their own paths, again a rich tapestry that he has created that I dont feel some of the reviewers here have done justice. Its a very long read if your up for it and perhaps covers some aspects of the building process with a bit too much tediousness but in all I found it to be a great read and will read it again in the future.

[pontalba]

Glad to see someone is still interested in this thread.

[pontalba]

Its been several months since I read "Pillars" (for the 2nd time) so the details are again fading, but I did not find the architectural detail tedious at all! The whys and hows of building have always facinated me, so I appreciated that as a necessary thread of the story. The book was also historically correct as far as I am aware.

I am happy that a sequel is in the works as well!

[Plekter]

I love this book. I read it in norwegian, and I'm sure I'll read it again someday, although it will be in english next time.

I love the medieval setting.

[ValkyrieRaven88]

Originally Posted by ions

While we're on the topic of this book I thought I would post this:



Found here.

I never knew there would be a sequel. That's great; I read this book last year and loved it.

[Ronny]

I finished this book today, and I thought it was ok. I started to get a bit bored with it towards the end. It seemed to be really drawn out and I was not as concerned with the characters by then. I did like the details of building the cathedrals and running the monastery.

[Tamsine]

I didn't finish it. I usually enjoy historical novels and I liked the beginning, but soon got bored with the characters. I dragged on for about 400 Pages because everyone told me it was worth hanging on. However, it didn't get better, so I gave up. Had it had 600 Pages or so, I'd probably have finished it, but I couldn't face another 700 pages of it.

[ilusyonada]

i've just read the book recently. it was on sale (really cheap. it was quite ok but not my favorite book by the author. it was quite long too, i struggled to finish it.

[bren]

Ken Follet's books are definitely readable, but I just can't get enthusiastic about them. The characters seem flat. Their actions seem forced. He has a style so contrary to what I prefer, I was surprised to be able to finish them at all, but they are pretty action-packed and full of interesting tidbits, mitigating the lack of sympathy. They do have god-awful villains, which is a plus, but I find the sex sort of skewed, even the bits that are supposed to be nice...

What I look for in a book is a sense of being cut off from my body and swimming, creeping, running, floating is some other parallel world. It is a lot to ask from a book, I know, but I also know it is possible, so when a book such as this falls short, it's only obvious. No such sense.

[angerball]

I really loved this book, but I read it a fair while ago, and have forgotten a lot. :o

I'm actually quite surprised that not that many people here seem to like it. It was the first historical fiction novel I've read, and has made me definately more open to the genre.

I even enjoyed all the cathedral - building prose (normally not my thing); I just basically loved the story. Also, I needed to see the villain (can't remember his name) get his comeuppance. :mad:

It's the best Ken Follet book I've read; I think it's different from what he normally writes.

[zen]

a sequel! after all this time.. i read this years ago, the bookshop guy recommended it to me one week when there were no new scifi or fantasy books available.. i remember really enjoying it.. it's a book i consider re-reading very so often, but alas.. there's always a new book to read instead!

[bren]

I certainly don't hate the Pillars book. My first sentence called them "readable," but perhaps that's too lukewarm a recommendation. I do like it on several accounts. The architectural detailing is very interesting, the basis in historical fact keeps me guessing, and reading nonfiction to pinpoint what is actually on the books, especially as regards the horrid villains, and the story does keep me wanting a satisfactoty resolution. All that said, I simply can't recommend it with very much vigor, because of my knowledge of how much I CAN love a book, this one, however fine, doesn't set up that fabulous cool transport.

[ions]

This blurb is now on Follett's Web site:

Sequel to 'The Pillars of the Earth'
Ever since The Pillars of the Earth was published in 1989, readers have been asking me to write a sequel.The book is so popular that I’ve been nervous about trying to repeat its success. But at last I’ve screwed up my courage and begun 'World without End'.

I couldn’t write another book about building a cathedral, because that would be the same book. And I couldn’t write another story about the same characters, because by the end of “Pillars” they are all very old or dead. So I’m working on a story that takes place in the same town, Kingsbridge, and features the descendants of the “Pillars” characters two centuries later.

The cathedral and the priory are again at the centre of a web of love and hate, greed and pride, ambition and revenge. But at the heart of the story is the greatest natural disaster ever to strike the human race: the plague known as the Black Death, which killed something like half the population of Europe in the fourteenth century. The people of the Middle Ages battled this lethal pestilence and survived – and, in doing so, laid the foundations of modern medicine.

I’m hoping to finish the book around May 2007, so that it can be published in time for Christmas that year. Wish me luck!