World Without End | World Without End

World Without End | World Without End

World Without End

	World Without End Dutton, 2007 average customer review:based on 389 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

World Without End

This was one of the best books I have read in a while. It was even better than Pillars of the Earth. I recommend that anyone who reads the book should read Pillars of the Earth first in order for World Without End to make sense, because in the book they make references to people in the Pillars of the Earth. It will keep you up at night wondering what is going to happen next.

World Without End

Slow at first. I made the big mistake of try to read it as I was still reading The Pillars or to try to go back an associate everything with it but once you give it it's own space it is very entretaining.

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Flow Chart of Characters

The novel does not match the intensity and compelling storyline of PotE, but is still a damn good summer read. I had to make a chart of characters as I went along, until I finally became familiar with them. There is a complete chart on Follett's website: http://www.ken-follett.com/wwe/characters.html I recommend printing this and using it as a bookmark. It will facilitate reading. Enjoy.

Medieval Soap Opera

This book made a great summer read! I found myself picking it up every chance I got because I couldn't wait to find out what would happen next. There are many stories and characters (100's) intricately woven together. I imagine that if soap operas had existed in the middle ages, the storylines would have been similar. However, if you are looking for deep reading, World is not it. Despite the book's long length, this is very light, easy reading. For me, the most interesting parts of the book were the ones dealing with the plague and how it changed medieval society. One thing that sets this book apart from other historical novels I've read is that it deals with everyday people rather than royalty and the nobility. The main characters are Merthin and Ralph, brothers whose father is a former knight now reduced to poverty, Gwenda, a girl born into utter poverty who manages to survive anyway, and Caris, the daughter of a wealthy merchant.

Many readers have criticized the amount of "gratuitous" sex in the book. There are, at times, a good bit, but no more than one finds on T.V. these days. Also, I would hardly call the sex scenes explicit, but so badly written that they are almost comical. They seem to have been written from a adolescent male's point of view. Many other criticisms were from people who did not even finish the book. I don't think it is fair to write a crtical review of a book you did not bother to finish. If they had hung in there, they would have found that there as an explanation for everything that happened.

While I enjoyed this book a great deal, I gave it 4 stars because I felt that it was poorly edited. There was too much repetition in the book. For example, Philemon and Godwyn were described as being "obsequious" at least ten times making me wonder why someone didn't pick up a thesaurus. One also gets tired of reading about how plump Madge Webber is, that Gwenda looks like a rodent and other repititious physical descriptions of the many characters.

One other complaint I have is that the Catholic Church is portrayed as being corrupt. While there was quite a bit of corruption in the church at that time, they were not all bad and I wish there had been a few pious church leaders portrayed in the book to balance out the bad leaders.

If you are looking for a light read that will keep you hooked I think you will enjoy this book. I hope Mr. Follett will write another sequel. I would love to find out how Kingsbridge Priory survives Henry VIII and the Protestant Reformation.

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