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The Pillars of the Earth | 
enlarge | Author: Ken Follett Publisher: Pan Books Category: Book
List Price: £8.99 Buy New: £2.87 You Save: £6.12 (68%)
New (33) Used (10) from £2.23
Rating: 126 reviews Sales Rank: 129
Media: Paperback Edition: New Ed Pages: 1100 Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.5 Dimensions (in): 7.7 x 4.9 x 1.9
ISBN: 0330450131 EAN: 9780330450133 ASIN: 0330450131
Publication Date: April 6, 2007 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days Condition: Brand new, in stock. Shipped from the UK by First Class Royal Mail service in eco-friendly packaging.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 121 more reviews...
Awesome July 23, 2008 I've just got to say this, I'm about Two thirds into this book and I must say its one of the most easy reading enjoyable book I have read. Great You have to read it. Buy it!
Unputdownable!!!!! July 21, 2008 I originally bought this book having seen Oprah give it a rave review, and thought it might be okay. How wrong I was! More than okay, it was fantastic! Laying in bed one morning, thinking about getting up, I leant over to the bookshelf and picked it up, just to read the first few pages to see if it gripped me. It did! I then spent the next two weeks doing very little else other than reading. It's true that it might not be everyones idea of perfect reading matter; how to build a cathedral! But it's so much more. You get so engrosed in the life of the characters, that at some points I was almost frightened with them! I've even tried to see just how many places, people etc I could find that were real. Just for info, I have another book along similar lines which I have enjoyed many times over the years, although not so hefty (or well known). "A Wayside Tavern" by Norah Lofts tells the story of an English tavern from Roman times to present day. Not Pillars of the Earth magnificence, but good all the same.
Gripping page turner set in medieval England July 4, 2008 1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Interweaving the lives of two families with a celibate monk and their arch-enemies, this tale brings to life adventure, conquest and power-lust in the twelfth century. Against the backdrop of cathedral building, all human emotions are exposed in the ruthless villains and (mostly) virtuous heroes. A classic tale of good and evil that captivates from the start - I couldn't put the book down.
Brilliant read July 3, 2008 1 out of 1 found this review helpful
From the first page I could not put this book down. At first sight a story about monks wanting to build a cathedral does not seem very exiting but the historical events and all the sub plots where fasinating.Not sure if I want to read the follow up "World without end" because usually it would be a let down, would be very hard to top this.
This book seems to be like Marmite... June 26, 2008 4 out of 4 found this review helpful
... you either love it or hate it! And, with apologies to all the fans, I'm not keen. It came highly recommended, interestingly enough (if you read Ken Follett's introduction to the latest edition), by my German other half. But I found the book clunking. It is quite obvious, by the tedious descriptions of the technicalities of cathedral building, that this is a subject dear to the author's heart. Fair enough, I'm just not into cathedral building at great length: that's my problem, you might say. But I found the characterisation shallow - it has been mentioned before that the goodies are clearly goodies and the baddies unmistakably baddies - the relationship between Tom the builder and Ellen stunningly unbelievable, the reiteration of what has just happened before you turned the last page patronising, and much of the historical detail inaccurate. For example Tom has a fourteen year old son who is described as a child. In those days a twelve year old would be sent out to work and fight wars not allowed to play with the children - Alfred helps his father, but would surely have already been apprenticed at his age. Had he cut down on description of the building work (but since this is Follett's passion he would hardly have done so) and treated his readers a bit more like intelligent adults who can remember what was said a few pages ago, the shorter version of the book might have been more readable. I hovered between two and three stars but in the end decided that I couldn't justify the third.
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