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 Epic Mar 20, 2010
I enjoyed this novel on so many levels. The story is unique and ambitious. The characters were a bit flat, but that's my only complaint. Reading this novel was time well spent.
 Great book with some history thrown in Mar 19, 2010
Some may be too critical of this book and its historical errors, but it is not a history. Don't read it as such and you will enjoy it. The characters are well filled out and you come to like the characters and actually care for them or really despise them unlike many books I've read where you don't really care. This review will be kept short because all you need to do is read and enjoy, don't be too critical.
Epic and largely accurate picture of medieval Europe Mar 19, 2010
I usually don't write reviews, but I'm annoyed by the few bad reviews that this book has received. Like everything else, people love to criticize what others have done rather than doing something themselves. As a former history grad student who studied medieval and early modern England extensively, this book paints a clear, interesting, and largely accurate picture of how nasty the politics of the period and the problems of civil war could be for an average person or even someone with an above-average position. It paints a beautiful, lively picture of the period, which is much more than many more academic histories acheive. It also provides a great introduction into the terms of cathedral architecture and an approachable explanation for why cathedrals were built the way they were in the period.
As far as the criticism of it as a medieval "soap opera" goes, the book has a lot of drama and the episodes do occur in a fashion that might seem unbelievable; but, in historical reality, the book's exploration of lawlessness that would have occurred during a civil war, the liberties that nobles were able to take with their serfs, and the pettiness of the politics explored by the characters does not seem inaccurate. And as far as the drama goes, it's not a cheesy soap opera and, even though some of the results may be predictable, the way the book arrives at them are rarely so.
Anyway, how many of us want to read a book where nothing happens? Some epic literary classics go hundreds of pages without any action and drag on and make you quit in the middle; you read 500 pages, convinced that the book will get better at some point simply because of its reputation, but it never gets better and you're stuck wondering why you gave it so much time and how on earth anyone could stick with it for another 600+ pages (speaking from experience). This is not that sort of book. It introduces the characters quickly and grabs your attention from the frst couple of chapters. The snobbier sort of intellectual claims that the slow-moving epic is the best kind of book; that we should all basically torture ourselves in our spare time reading something horribly boring just because that's what smart people are supposed to like. But you don't have to be a non-intellectual to enjoy this book. It does not appeal to the "lowest common denominator" as some of the hyper-critical, puffing, or demeaning reviews claim. Rather, it opens up a little-known period of history to a wider audience. And it's vastly entertaining. The author does a great job of interspersing the episodes with interior commentary in the characters' own minds and drawing the characters with various flaws and good points, making them complex, while still understandable.
I've already lost several hours of sleep because I couldn't put the thing down. And the fact that I only have about 250 pages left in it makes me a little sad. I've truly enjoyed it and found it a very satisfying read, even though I don't read a lot of modern fiction. Please, if you're looking for an excellent, entertaining work, completely ignore the insults levelled at the book and, by extension, anyone who enjoys it, and just enjoy the work as an evocative and vivid piece of fiction.
1 of 3 found the following review helpful:
 Middle age soap opera Mar 14, 2010
After reading all the amazing reviews of this book, I got it for my Kindle, thinking I'd been missing out on a great read all these years. I was expecting a great work of literary fiction. About a quarter of the way through, I started to realize what was bothering me about this book. It's like a modern day soap opera set in the Middle Ages. Usually when you read a book or see a movie set in a certain time period, the author will make an effort to set the tone with dialogue that fits that period. Not so in this book. As another reviewer noted, if you didn't know any better, but for the descriptions of the harsh conditions, you would think it was set in modern day NYC. Modern lingo, hot sex scenes, etc. Middle ages for the masses, I guess. You get to know the characters on the surface due to the time span of the novel, but it's glossy. You don't feel like you really get to know them inside and out. Now that I'm over half way through, I'll keep reading just to finish because it is mildly interesting, but I feel a bit like I'm wasting time reading a Harlequin romance or something.
The Second Time I've Read This Outstanding Book Mar 13, 2010
Strong historical fiction like Pillars of the Earth is highly entertaining and very enlightening. Ken spent years studying how cathedrals were built throughout medieval England. He then spins a gripping tale (it took him three years of writing) of good and evil, treachery and intrigue, violence (the most revolting parts of the novel that shows just how brutal life was in those times), and architectural beauty. The story shows how the human spirit, love, loyalty, and friendship can shine through during times of war, religious strife and power struggles which tear lives and families apart.
In the fictional town of Kingsbridge we experience firsthand the ups and downs of life in a typical British town during early medieval times of the 1100s. The book provides deep appreciation for what builders and artists accomplished with very basic technology over decades (generally more than 30 years) to construct towering cathedrals that still stand majestically many centuries later. It also shows just how good we have life now!
An eight hour TV mini-series is currently in post production based on this epic novel (400, 000 words). Early video clips and Ken's blog updating this work in progress really make this look like a "must see" once it's available.
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