The Pillars of the Earth
by Ken Follett
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Book Reviews of The Pillars of the Earth
Book Review: Entertaining historical fiction - but not as good as Katherine or The Physician
Summary: 4 Stars
This epic novel of building a church in twelfth century England was entertaining and exciting. It was a real page turner and I found myself looking forward to moments of quiet when I could read the book. As a work of historical fiction, much of the story was accurate - particularly the storyline related to Maude (Empress Matilda), King Stephen, King Henry II and Thomas Beckett. I found this work particularly interesting, however, because it covered various social classes and the impact of a destabilizing civil war on their livelihoods. This book brings out the fragility and tenuousness of the well-being and survival of the peasant classes, their dependence on the good will of their feudal lords, the church, and mother nature. Furthermore, the novel brought out what a massive undertaking it was to build a cathedral, both in terms of marshalling resources to build it and in procuring political support.
There are several weaknesses in this novel. First, some of the language is anachronistic. For instance, no medieval person would use the word "celebrity." Furthermore, Aliena, one of the main characters is described as wearing her hair in loose curls, which is also anachronistic. While she may have worn her hair loose as a child, a medieval woman would not. While these were not major problems, it was a bit distracting at times to see these anachronisms.
Second, the character of William Hamleigh is not well developed. He is a major character in the novel and he is very flat. William reminded me of an R-rated version of Gaston in Beauty and the Beast - a cartoon villain. While I realize that the middle ages were brutal times and William's brutality would have existed at those times, his obsession with Aliena and his single-minded desire for vengeance against her lack tempering with real human characteristics. The author does try to humanize him by giving him a fear of hell, but that humanization is insufficient to create a more developed character.
Despite these weaknesses, this is a fascinating novel. I am looking forward to reading the sequel. For people who enjoyed this novel, I also recommend The Physician by Noah Gordon and Katherine by Anya Seton. Both of those novels are excellent epics of medieval England with stronger character development.
Book Review: Compelling plot, weakly told
Summary: 2 Stars
This was recommended to me by a neighbor, and in the week I took to read it, an unbelievable number of people told me how great it was. I was highly disappointed.
The plot is compellingly told; the book is hard to put down. But that's the best I can say for it. A summary of the book could go as follows: every time Prior Phillip and Tom Builder get momentum for their cathedral, William gets in the way. It's nearly a thousand pages describing every way the author could think of to have the cathedral project nearly ruined. Included are a number of side plots that are woven into the main storyline fairly well.
However, the storyline somewhat disjoint. It seems the author realizes occasionally that his book is meant to be a summer beach read, so he tries to put 'romance' into it between the fast-paced action scenes. There are several scenes of sexual encounters that do nothing to further the plot, and the reader is often unnecessarily reminded of just how much William likes to rape and pillage. We understand that aspect of his character after the first time, and nothing in the book would lead us to think he'd change, so I wasn't sure why I kept reading the same scene in different settings.
Moreover, the characters are one-dimensional, so the storylines that detail with romantic relationships are not only disjoint but also uninteresting and don't flow with the action/adventure part involving the new cathedral and the politics of the times.
My last criticism of the book is that language and sentence structure were subpar. Oddly chosen words and phrases that didn't match the overall tone of the book would draw me out of the plot and distract me as I read. (Did Tom Builder, whose understanding of beauty led him to settle for nothing less than cathedral-building, really have no better opinion on his wife than that she had a "hot body?") It was very disconcerting to find occasional use of modern slang in a book set in medieval England and otherwise written in a more formal English.
I heard so many great reviews of this book that I read til the end, thinking surely it would redeem itself, and my friends and family hadn't been wrong. Had it been edited better, I could agree with them, but when I finished, I just felt cheated.
Book Review: Not bad at all. I'd read it again.
Summary: 4 Stars
I finished The Pillars of the Earth today and all in all, I enjoyed it. I'm a big fan of historical fiction and was interested in the details of "everyday" life, although based on some negative reviews here I'll have to research to find out what Follett incorrectly portrayed. No historical novel is perfect.
As others have noted, this is a character-driven novel. Expect to love it if you enjoy books which immerse you in personalities and personal conflicts rather than grander, larger struggles. Each of the main protagonists was well developed and felt believable.
The antagonists were, I must say, a different story. William of Hamleigh was such a cape-swishing, mustache-twirling villain stereotype that I found it difficult to get into hating him at first, he was just SO bad. We do get a peek into the basis for William's terrible personality but it comes so late in the book that one will already have decided to take him as a cardboard cut-out of a bad guy and enjoy the book in spite of his flatness or one will have abandoned the book long before.
In spite of the somewhat flat "bad guys," though, the interactions between the well developed "good guys" really makes this book hard to put down. I found no problem with the few sex scenes - they were tastefully written and highlighted the love between the characters; they were not what I'd call "gratuitous." Nor did I have any issue with the violence. While a lot of violence occurs, it never felt out of place or over the top to me. The rape scenes were hard to read through but did much in establishing the characters involved and as such did not feel gratuitous either.
Like me, the author is an atheist and I think he did an admirable job of portraying many different points of view in his characters, from the utterly faithful to the unbelieving with all stops in between. He never makes mock of religious beliefs, nor does he make his atheist characters more admirable or worthy than the very religious. His characters simply are what they are, and he explores most of them fully and well.
Minus one star because some judicious editing would have been welcome in some areas; and I also found myself wondering frequently, "Is Aliena REALLY worth all this?"
Book Review: So many things worng with it....
Summary: 1 Stars
I got this as an audiobook - just something to listen to on the ipod while I cleaned the house and ran errands. It got really good reviews so I certainly expected to be entertained. I wasn't.
Here are my gripes. This has been mentioned before, but it bears repeating: the characters are one-dimensional. They have potential, but for some reason, they never live up to it. They flatline early on and stay there. Additionally, I could never really figure out if there was supposed to be a main character. I figured it should be Jack, but I honesty am not sure even after completing the book.
The story itself is also really dull. You could see all the plot twists and outcomes coming from a mile away. There was no suspense whatsoever. Nothing was shocking, which is odd considering how many people fornicated, raped, murdered, and died.
The descriptions of the architecture are pointless. Personally, I could only really envision about 20% of it. If you could picture all of it, then wow, I'm impressed. Good for you.
And my final big gripe: (spoilers if you have never taken a history class). The book wraps up with the murder of Thomas Beckett and the repentance of Henry II. WTF???? These people were barely in the book at all, and only popped up in the very end. I could have cared less about them, yet somehow they're used as the dramatic catalyst to wrap everything up? HUH???? I am guessing nobody complained about this before because most people did not finish the book. Well good for you, because the ending is disjointed and nonsensical.
I get why people give this good reviews. I know because I have had roommates just like those who give this good reviews. They have not read a book since college or high school, and even then those were only the books they were forced to read. Now they're adults and they realize its been about three years since they read a proper book. They pick this one up and they are just so proud of themselves that they read a) such a BIG book! b) actually finished it and c) it's, like, historical and stuff. So they are in no position to recognize that it's not a good book. It's really quite sad actually.
Book Review: Oprah's good choice
Summary: 5 Stars
Thanks to Oprah because if not for her, I would have missed one of the great books ever written. Come to think of it, this was published in 1989 and with so many books being published every year, it's easy to miss a good one published more than 10 years ago. I have read The Eye of the Needle when I was 14 so I already had an idea of Ken Follett's calibre as a writer. His description of sex is really detailed. I can tell you that because the first thing that comes to my mind if you say Eye of the Needle is the sex part there and not the spionage. Anyway back to the Pillars of the Earth, if you like drama, suspense and 12th century England where anarchy reigned, this is worthy of your time. It is more than a 1000 pages but it will keep you restless after you have finished reading for the day because the main characters end up in continuous trials. It is very hard to be poor at that time where there is no justice system. It's power talk, if you have more warriors, then you can just invade any town. If you are a landlord, you can just destroy anybody's life for that matter without being put into trial. I read this book in 5 days. The events will keep you worried for the lives of the characters especially when their livelihood is at stake all because some egoistic barbaric warriors came to town to destroy. The book also tells us about evil priests who used religion to acquire castles and build the most fabulous cathedrals at the expense of the peasants.
It starts with the story Tom the builder who was building a house for William Hamleigh, one of the son of the powerful warlords at that time. The construction was cancelled because the fiance of William whose name is Aliena called off the wedding. From there, the saga begins. Tom couldn't find a work so he and his family walked by foot across England to find work. Tom's wife died giving birth in the forest in winter time. Out of desperation, they left the baby on top of the grave of his wife. A priest found it and brought it to a priory. The head of the priory whose name is Philip decided to keep the baby who was given the name Jonathon. This development will keep you in utmost curiousity that will keep you reading through the night.