Book Review-The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett

Title: The Pillars of the Earth

 Author: Ken Follett

Series:   The Pillars of the Earth #1

Published:   2002, 2007 by Pan in the UK.

Length: 1088 pages

Warnings: graphic violence, graphic rape, graphic sex

Source: library

Other info: There is a sequel, World Without End. There was a miniseries of this. Ken has written lots of books.

Summary :  The spellbinding epic set in twelfth-century England, The Pillars of the Earth tells the story of the lives entwined in the building of the greatest Gothic cathedral the world has ever known—and a struggle between good and evil that will turn church against state, and brother against brother

Review:  The 1000 page book, overall, tells of the building of a cathedral. Included in that we have romance across all generations, tensions among family, church corruption, and drama every step of the way.

I read this book because one of my friends gets excited by it. Really excited. As in fangirling to everyone without pause for breath excited. I had to see what this was all about, especially seeing as it concerns the medieval period, which I loved studying in year 7.

You’re instantly pulled n with a hanging. You soon meet Tom and family. His wife dies after childbirth, leaving starving Alfred and Martha and Tom to carry on looking for work, leaving the child at the roadside. He gets taken in by a monk who is brother to Philip, one who has been at the church for most of his life and despairs at badly run priories (like his). Meanwhile, Tom meets Ellen, her son Jack, and travels with them. Years later, the civil war over the throne of England leads to Aliena and her brother getting kicked out of their earldom by Wililam of Hamleigh, and they travel. All these characters meet at Kingsbridge, where a cathedral is being built.

It’s all set up quickly, and the world, the setting of Medieval England is put across so well via the language and atmosphere and tone, you really feel like you’re there.

All the characters are really well developed. My favourite is Aliena, despite the fact that she is thrown out of her home and she suffers rape and torment from William, she stands up for herself, becomes a successful woll merchant, and is generally awesome. I also really liked Philip, who is a sane churchman, amongst the corrupted ones, who does the best he can for families and his church. Also Ellen, who just did what she wanted, never mind the consequences. Overall, I liked all the characters apart from William, for whom asshole just doesn’t cover it. His treatment of women, well actually everybody, was downright awful. You are warned.

Despite its length, I got through Pillars of the Earth in a week. It’s such a compelling book that you just have to keep reading-the backstory, the lack of unbearable waffling and the pace meant I got on really well with this book.

There’s a lot of timeskips, which work plotwise, but are annoying because I’m not good at mentally aging people. One character starts age 30 and ends 50. Vision issues.

Overall: Strength 5 tea to an epic historical. Must read book 2 soon. (edit:: I did.)  

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | Author website | 

Book Review-Les Miserables by Victor Hugo

Title: Les Miserables

 Author:  Victor Hugo

Series:  N/A

Published:  1862 by A. Lacroix.

Length: Anywhere between 800 and 1300 pages.

Warnings: child abuse, a lot of violence

Source: free kindle download

Other info: It has been made into films, musicals over the world, and has gained a rather large fandom.  Victor Hugo also wrote The Hunchback of Notre Dame and a few other things.

Summary : Victor Hugo’s tale of injustice, heroism and love follows the fortunes of Jean Valjean, an escaped convict determined to put his criminal past behind him. But his attempts to become a respected member of the community are constantly put under threat: by his own conscience, when, owing to a case of mistaken identity, another man is arrested in his place; and by the relentless investigations of the dogged policeman Javert. It is not simply for himself that Valjean must stay free, however, for he has sworn to protect the baby daughter of Fantine, driven to prostitution by poverty. A compelling and compassionate view of the victims of early nineteenth-century French society, Les Misérables is a novel on an epic scale, moving inexorably from the eve of the battle of Waterloo to the July Revolution of 1830

In accordance with the no-spoilers-on-things-over-fifty-years-old policy, I have summarised the entire book in the first paragraph.  Also, details and things may have slipped my mind and I refuse to be pedantic over a thousand-page book where I can’t remember half the characters. For a better plot summary, see lemonlye’s condensing of the book.

Review: Jean Valjean has, said by Becca, “been unfairly imprisoned for stealing a load of bread”. John Valjean has, said by me, “had a s*** life. And it gets worse. Follow him as he gets kicked out of places, gets taken into places, takes in a girl as his adopted daughter, watches her grow up and fall in love, watches her boyfriend join in a failing revolution, takes part in a failing revolution, watches her marry, and dies. Also, watch everyone else you love  die along the way.

I think I was a bit late to the party with this one. Oh well. I only started it after the hype had died down a bit, and after a lot of persuading from Sarah.

The opening is ridulously slow. It picks up a bit, but you still wonder when something good’ll happen. At around 10%, Cosette is given to the Thenadiers and it all gets going.  The narrator’s thoughts just wander and wander and I was considering giving up a bit.

At the start of each volume, and at quite a few books, there’s a lot of rambling about everything.  The worst case of this was Book 1 of volume 2. That was just so much on the topic of Waterloo and only the last few paragraphs had any relavence to the rest of the story.

The narration swings between good, action packed, and ugh-why-are-you-telling-me-this. Some of their thoughts are interesting. Most of their thoughts are too longwinded to enjoy. I understand the rambling, when it fits the characters and the situations, and the history lessons are useful, but really. Not in the middle of the barricade scene full of excitement! Also, regarding length of waffling- I read on my kindle with the smallest font, smallest line spaces, as much on the page as possible. In a few memorable occasions, descriptions of things and Grantaire rambling and Jean Valjean making lots of speeches, there has been three screen’s worth of pure text. No paragraph breaks or indents. I don’t know if it was the formatting or something but long pieces of text are just…no. I can’t deal with this I’ll lose my place and my head hurts. And, having just flicked through my QI 1227 facts book, it’s told me that there’s one sentence that is 823 words long. If that’s not rambling, I don’t know what is.

Characters. Where do I begin? THERE’S SO MANY I’M NOT EVEN GOING TO TRY AND REMEMBER THEM ALL BECAUSE I BELIEVE THAT THAT WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE. Jean Valjean is a really good protagonist, going through a lot and still winning in terms of parenting.  Javert is one of possible ten policemen in the entirety of France, who should not be funny but is. The Thenadiers are really evil and don’t provide any comic relief. Don’t believe the musical. Cosette is a strong little girl going through all that when she was little. When she grew up, she got a little less awesome, fitting into the feminine stereotype of the day. Gavroche, the little kid revolutionary, was my favourite character for courage and adorableness reasons. Eponine, the one who loves Marius and crossdresses to get onto the barricades, comes a close second. I feel so sorry for her, what with her treatment by Marius and everything . The Barricade Boys, I love them all. Enjolras just needs a huge hug. Marius was nice at times, at other times stupidly annoying, at other times, a complete dick.  He’s very moodswingy. And forgetful of the fact that all his friends die. The criminals are amusing. Ok, maybe that does include Thenadier. But he’s not funny in the way that you get told he is. Fantine was too cute, until...yeah. The old guy who I’ve forgotten the name of is epicness.. let’s just go back to the Barricade Boys again. Ok moving on.

Emotions. Broken. There were times where I just had to stop and think “why why why”.  All your favourite characters die. There’s like, five in one paragraph one after another.  Worst part was near the very end, where...ugh. Jean Valjean and Cosette feels. That was hard. And then Mel, beautiful girl that she is reading it in French (due to it being her first language) tells me how much worse it gets because of the swapping between pronouns and it’s all “how can you do that to me Victor Hugo?”

There’s some more things I probably could say. But I actually can’t due to fingers and emotional breaking and stuff. You get the idea from this, right?

Overall:   Strength 4 tea. A beautifully emotional story, but the rambling is just too much to enjoy.                          

Links: Amazon| Amazon kindle free | The Book Depository | Goodreads |

PS. Rambling is contagious. Apologies regarding the length.