Ken Follett - A Dangerous Fortune

Book review written by Brian Lowen for a recorded bookshow being aired in October 2013.

This Book was first published in 1993 and has recently been reprinted. I read it several years ago, but when it was brought to my notice by Amazon I ordered another copy because although I have read all of Ken Follett’s books over the years, I have not kept them.

I was very glad to read this book again as I had forgotten what a great story it is.

A shocking secret behind a young boy’s death leads to three generations of treachery in this absorbing drama of wealth, passion and revenge, set amid the riches and decadence of Victorian England.

By the 1860s, the Pilasters are one of the world’s greatest banking families, with connections that reach from the City of London to far afield colonies. However, as the family grows richer in the shadow of oppression and tragedy, their very future is threatened by the self-same ambition and greed that first earned them their fortune.

So reads the blurb on the back cover and it is another hit for Ken Follett which has great significance in our modern times with the rise and fall of banks. There are some great characters in this

book that you really get involved with and with some of them you are continually hoping that they will get their come-uppance.

A really great page-turner of a book that you will not want to put down until you reach the last page.

Ken Follett - World Without End

Review by Ro Bennett on show 25th November 2010
World Without End by Ken Follett

I have just finished watching the TV series Pillars of The Earth which is an adaptation of Ken Follett’s best seller from 1989 and I remembered that I had bought the sequel World Without End so decided to read that.

Pillars of the Earth is basically about the building of a cathedral in the 12th century and is a gripping story that I thoroughly enjoyed - though I wasn’t keen on the graphic violence and sexual content in either book, however they are depicting very unsettled and brutal times.

Like Pillars of the Earth, World Without End is set in the fictional Wiltshire Cathedral city of Kingsbridge, but it is now 200 years later, between 1327 and 1361. The cathedral’s structure is collapsing and the main mason and architect involved in the rebuilding is Merthin, the son of a soldier who just happens to be a descendant of Tom the Builder who who began the building of the cathedral in the first book.

There are many similarities - in Pillars of The Earth there is intrigue and mystery surrounding the father of Jack the builder and in this book there is a hidden scroll which contains a dangerous secret. The hiding place is known only by Merthin and a monk who was a former knight. Despite being 200 years later, life is still precarious, unpredictable and brutal. The book is riddled with intrigue, treachery, injustice, horrendous punishments, corruption and superstition, and to top it all the Plague - the Black Death strikes in 1347.

World without End is very informative about what life was like in that era - and like the Pillars of the Earth it has inspired me to research the history of the time on the Internet. Nothing has particularly motivated me to explore life in the middle ages up until now so I’m finding it very interesting.

I haven’t finished the book yet, there are 1058 pages - but I am enjoying it very much so far. I was drawn into the story right from the start and find it a page turner and can’t wait to get back to it.

Talking about the length of the book, one review commented, ‘Weighing in at 2.6 pounds and lasting 1024 pages, World without End could double as a doorstop.My husband immediately started calling it Book without End.’

Another wrote: ‘Assuming you can pick the novel up, you won’t be able to put it down’

I got the best of both worlds - I bought the e book!

Ro Bennett

Ken Follett - Fall of Giants

review by Brian Lowen on show 13th October 2011

Another great saga from Ken Follett. As good as his previous long works – Pillars of the Earth and World without End. This is book one of a trilogy

The story is set in the period leading up to and subsequent to the first World War and once again a tremendous amount of research has gone into this book, blending real life characters with fictional ones

The story centres around five families – one each in America, Germany, Wales, England and Russia, from the high-born to lowly peasants. You get to know each family as Follett weaves his story around them, with great characters with whom you can empathise as we follow their adventures during the ten years covered in the book. At 850 pages long it is not an easy book to hold but well worth the effort.

The story starts in 1911 as 13 year old Billy Williams starts his first day at work down a Welsh coal mine.
The Williams family is connected by romance and enmity to the Fitzherberts, aristocractic coal mine owners. Lady Maud Fitzherbert falls in love with Walter von Ulrich, a spy at the German Embassy in London. Their destiny is entangled with that of Gus Dewar, ambitious young aide to U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. Two orphaned Russian brothers soon become involved, but Grigori and Lev Peshkov’s plans to emigrate to America falls foul of war, conscription and revolution

The story goes into great diplomatic detail as the various countries spar with one another before the outbreak of the war. You are left wondering what on earth Britain was doing getting involved in this battle between warring nations in central Europe, but it all boils down to a power struggle with Britain still feeling it has to be the most powerful in the world, as it was, building up to this conflict. But the subsequent horrendous loss of life in pointless, repetitious battles that went on for months, with no one gaining an advantage, should have resulted in courts martial for the Generals involved.

A book I thoroughly enjoyed, and can recommend. I look forward to the next book in this trilogy.

Ken Follett - Night Over Water

Review written by Brian Lowen & read live on the bookshow on Thurs 12th March 2015.

There are very few books that I have read twice but this is one of them.

I first read it several years ago, so I picked it up when I saw it in the Charity Shop and the story was fresh again.

Most of the story is set aboard a luxury flying boat, one of Boeing B-314 Clippers operated by Pan American Airways. These were large aircraft, the most luxurious ever built with seats for only about 20 people who were flown across the Atlantic to America in complete luxury. As the journey took over 24 hours the passengers spent a night on the aircraft with the seats converting into bunks as on a sleeper train.

War has just broken out in Europe in 1939 and most of the passengers are fleeing England but for different reasons. There is a fascist English Lord and his family who have to flee from possible internment, a German scientist escaping from the Nazis, a murderer under FBI escort, a young wife fleeing a domineering husband and an unscrupulous thief.

We hear each one’s story and then KF weaves them together in a grand story. You are never sure how it will end as Follett keeps you guessing right to the end. Each character is beautifully drawn so that you feel you are on the aircraft with them. 

I cannot give many details of the story as it is so complicated with all the various characters, but it is easily followed. The characters are fictional of course, but the plane actually existed and flew this route, although only for a limited time.

Even though the book is 640 pages long, you will be disappointed when you get to the end.

Another grand saga from Follett and thoroughly recommended.

Ken Follett - Lie Down With Lions

Review by Showhost
The story starts in Paris, 1981, but is based mainly in Afghanistan. The main characters are Jane Ellis & Jean-Pierre. Jane, an attractive englishwoman, works in Paris as an interpreter (Russian & French into English). She is having a passionate relationship with Ellis, who claims to be a poet.
Jean-Pierre, a member of the Communist Party, and a doctor in a Paris hospital, secretly admires and desires Jane. He wants to help in war ravaged Afghanistan and is going to Afghanistan, ostensibly, to provide medical assistance to the rebel forces fighting against the Soviets. He asks Jane if she would come out to be his interpreter and assist medically. He is jealous of Ellis and knows that her relationship with Ellis may stop her from going.
When Jean-Pierre finds out that Ellis is an undercover CIA spy, he can't wait to expose his lies to Jane.
Jane is appalled that Ellis has lied to her so she leaves and goes to Afghanistan (valley of the 5 lions) where she finds herself in harsh conditions and constant threat of Russian attack as the rebels fight for their freedom from the Russians. She marries Jean-Pierre. They minister to the local inhabitants, who have never seen a doctor before, and patch together and stitch-up the wounded warriors. An American visits the valley with an important message from the White House for Masud, a famous and effective guerrilla leader. The messenger is Ellis. A terrible treachery is discovered, shortly after he arrives and Jane is abandoned by her husband and has to get herself and her baby out of the war zone.

It is a romantic adventure, a lustful Mills & Boon. I was disappointed in this book, he has wrote better. As I had taken it on holiday I didn't have much choice so I made myself finish it. Unfortunately, I read this book after I had read The Kite Runner and 1000 Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini and compared to these it was lame. Khaled tells it as it is, warts and all, where as Follett dressed it up & wartered it down. There were one or two moments that grabbed your attention with action and steamy sex scenes but the characters didn't grow on me.
It was written in the late 1980's and perhaps if I had read it then I would have really liked it as there were not many books, fictional, written about that period in Afghanistan history.

Ken Follett - Fall of Giants

review by showhost
I don’t know where to start with this review as it has been so long since I started it! Its over 800 pages long and spans from the coronation of King George 5th in 1911 to the first labour government in Jan 1924.

I was disappointed in the book as it reminded me in parts of Catherine Cookson with a history lesson. As in true Catherine Cookson fashion, the maid Ethel becomes pregnant by the Lord Fitzherbert but has to leave Wales because of the shame. Her brother comes across Lord Fitzherbert again in the war and obviously there is a running hatred between them.
It’s a saga, intertwining fates of five families, in Wales, England, Germany, Russia and America. The Williams family, who live in Aberowen, Wales and work the coal pits for the Lord Fitzherbert; to Grigori and his brother in Russia who are struggling to live under the Tzarist rule and the women's suffrage movement..
The story sweeps us up into the the simmering bickering that leads so many countries, eventually, into World War 1 and the Russian revolution and the start of ‘the Soviet’.
The story of Grigori and his brother Lev (good brother naughty brother) has shades of Kane and Abel by Jeffrey Archer.
Not in the same league as ‘Pillars of the Earth’ but I wanted to return to the book and wanted to keep reading it. You just have to shrug at the Cookson bits and wait for the next ‘grab your attention’ bit.
This is part one of the century trilogy, I will read the sequel.

show 17th dec 09

First of a christmas special. this week we had six guests (Maggie Perkovic, Corinna Christopher, Brian Lowen, Malcolm Martland, Ro Bennett & Babs Simpson)in the studio and looked back over the centurys fiction & non-fiction bestsellers in decades, so we had 1909. 1919, 1929 etc.right up until 2009. This was also interspersed with a sprinkling of christmas jokes.
A quick taste of the fiction books that were around, remember any?:
1909: The Trail of the Lonsesome Pine by John Fox Jnr. (well most of us know the song)
1919: The Four Horsement of the Apocalypse by V Blasco Ibanez
1929: All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque ( recognised non-fiction was 'Believe it or Not' by Robert L Ripley)
1939: Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck & Rebeccas by Daphne Du Maurier (recognised non-fiction was Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler)
1949: Pride's Castle by Frank Yerby (couple of us had read his books), interestingly there were 3 non-fiction all about Canasta!
1959: Dr Zhivago by Boris Pasternak, Hawaii by James Michener (very good author) & Lady Cahtterley's Lover by DH Lawrence. (Maggie had to swoon over the non-fiction Twixt Twelve and Twenty by Pat Boone).
1969: The Godfather by Mario Puzo, Inheritors Harold Robbins (NF: the Galloping Gourmet, Graham Kerr).
1979: We are getting into Robert Ludlum, Arthur Hailey, Stephen Kind, John Le Carre (NF: Steve Martin, Henry Kissinger, Lauren Bacall)
1989: Ken Follett (Pillars of the Earth), Danielle Steel, Tom Clancy, Salman Rushdie,
(NF The Memoirs of Nancy Reagan)
1999: John Grisham, Michael Crichton, Maeve Binchy, (NF Guinness World Records)

11th June 2009

Guests today were Brian Lowen, back from an enforced absence as he put up for council and got in (well done Brian), and Barbara Simpson.
Books reviewed were Angels & Demons by Dan Brown, Betrayal by Clare Francis, December by Elizabeth H Winthrop & The Luminous Life of Lilly Aphrodite by Beatrice Colin.
The last two were on the Richard & Judy shortlist for the Galaxy 2009 award, the winner of which was Kate Atkinson (When Will there be Good News).
Funny how although Angels & Demons was written before the Da Vinci Code, it was the Da Vinci which came out on film first.
Suggested similar authors for Clare Francis were: Ken Follett & Sebastian Faulks
The Orange Prize for Fiction was won by Marilynne Robinson (Home)

James Patterson - Mary Mary

Revieved by Showhost April 2008
This is back to the James Patterson we know and love. I was so disappointed after 'The Jester' by Patterson & Goss that I wondered if I would read another of his! However, prior to going on holiday recently I went into the local charity shop to purchase some holiday reading matter (read & leave) and there was a James Patterson, another Alex Cross murder mystery. I always try and play safe when going on holiday as there's nothing worse than trying a new author/s and then discovering that you don't like any of them so I look for authors I've read & liked. As the charity shop were still offering 3 for £1 I picked up this book, Harlan Coben & Ken Follett.

There is another psycho on the loose, this time in Hollywood, and Alex Cross (now and FBI agent) happens to be on holiday (or vacation as the Americans call it)at Disneyworld with his family - Nana Mama, Jannie Damon & little Alex. The murders are high profile Hollywood people and after each murder an email is sent to the 'Los Angeles Times' editor by the murderer calling him or herself Mary Smith.
At the same time Alex and his family are being shadowed by a journalist who is claiming to do an article on 'a day in the life of Alex Cross', but the journalist is starting to overstretch his mark. Alex is also battling for more custody of his youngest child Alex, who lives with his estranged mother in another state.
Although Alex is on holiday, he is asked by his boss to have a look at the crime scene and report what he finds. This is the beginning of his involvement which gets deeper and more dangerous. Is the murderer an obsessed fan or a spurned actor or something more terrifying?
There are the usual twists and turns and false leads which Patterson fans come to expect from his thrillers. It was a good pacey read which kept you turning the pages and has put a little of my faith back in Patterson again.

Ken Follett - Edge of Eternity

review written by Brian Lowen & read live on bookshow 4th Dec 2014

 This is the last in his trilogy entitled The Century and covers the period 1961 to 1989.

It is a real saga, a large book comprising over 1000 pages. Although it is a long story the interest does not flag. There are a great many different people in the book, some fictitious, but some real people – mostly prominent people at that time. The large number of characters do get a bit confusing for the reader, but after reading a few paragraphs of the chapter your memory picks up again from where you left off. The characters are all well described and formed in your mind as the story progresses.

The story centres around families living in America, England, Russia and East Germany and it is how their lives evolve through the years that forms the basis of the book. The story features several memorable events:

In East Germany, set up after the end of the Second World War and controlled by Russian communism, we live through the setting up of the wall between east and west, which started off as a barbed wire fence which then progressed to a double high concrete wall and how it affected people living either side of the wall.

In America the story deals with the separation of blacks and whites, particular in the south, and the violent racism that existed at that time and the campaign of Martin Luther King to bring equality between the two races. We are also involved in the Cuban crisis and hear the story from both sides, by an aide to First Secretary Khrushchev and an aide to President Kennedy, which is very interesting. We also hear of Kennedy’s assassination and also that of Martin Luther King. We also hear about the Watergate scandal which led to the downfall of the Nixon campaign. Now I know what it was all about as I had been a bit vague on that subject.

In Czechoslovakia we hear about the rise and fall of Dubcek and in Poland the rise of Lech Walesa and the formation of the trade union Solidarity.

These may seem a list of boring historical events, but KF has the knack of weaving an interesting story around these happenings that holds your attention and your interest.

Thoroughly recommended as a really good story.

Ken Follett – Winter of the World

This is part of the century trilogy & is going to be a hard book to review because it is a thick (818 pages), hardbacked book (as people who have seen me carrying this big book around will verify).  Hard to review because by the time I got to the end of this book I had forgotten half of what happened earlier on in the story, there are also many characters to remember too.

Basically it carries on from the first of the trilogy ‘Fall of Giants’ which follows the lives of 5 families each from different parts of the world – Wales, Russia, America, Germany & English – taking us through the first world war and the Russian revolution.  You need to read this book first.

In this second book of the trilogy we carry on with the same families but obviously many more characters come into play as the members of these families diverse.  It takes the reader from the Russian revolution through to the second world war and the events & political issues that led up to it.  Hitler, Stalin, Churchill, Roosevelt, the spread of Facism, the brutality of the Nazis and their extermination of handicapped people, not just jews and homosexuals.  The beastiality of the Russian Red army who were as bad if not worse than the German Brownshirts.  I really enjoyed Fall of Giants & was looking forward to this his second and I did enjoy it, I loved the mixture of fact & fiction – but - there were times when it was pointless, when the sentence/paragraph was inconsequential, especially as the story went on. For example:

(when working on the first atomic bomb the tension was unbearable as the rods were slowly removed from the neutron/uranium pile) : Greg looked at his watch.  It was eleven thirty.

Suddenly there was a loud crash.  Everyone jumped. 

McHugh said: F-ck!

Greg said what happened:?

Oh, I see’ said McHugh.  The radiation level activated the safety mechanism and released the emergency control rod, that’s all’.

The Italian scientist announced “I’m hungry.  Let’s go to lunch’ in his Italian accent it came out: “I’m hungary.  Les go to luncha”.

'Volodya was travelling to Alkbuquerque by train, he was a Russian spy trying to recruit an American scientist.  ‘ He went to the toilet to change his underwear & put on a new shirt he had bought in Saks’ ….why do we need to know this?

I would suggest you wait until just before the third book comes out in 2014 before reading the first two otherwise the 6 month wait from now until publication will fade your memory. It was a couple of months from me reading the first book to the second – not recommended to do.

Ken Follett - Winter of the World

reviewed by Brian Lowen on recorded show for 19th Sept 2013

This book is a real saga – not to be attempted unless you are prepared to concentrate, as the story involves several families, set in various countries – Russia, Germany, Spain, USA, England and Wales – all variously intertwined.

This is the second book in the trilogy – the Century, and it does help to read the first book first as the families continue in this book with their descendants.

The story is set in the period 1933 to 1949, leading up to , and including , the second world war and is historically very interesting, ie the politics involved in the Spanish civil war and Hitler’s rise to power in Germany. He actually did a lot of good for the country in a brutal way before his lust for greater power overwhelmed him. It is easy to understand how some politicians in other countries admired him. But Moseley’s fascists in Britain never managed to succeed as the Nazis did.

The story is too involved to précis, but you can keep flipping back to the beginning of the book to check the cast list given there, although this is not so easy if reading the book on a kindle.

I found the historical side of the story very interesting. Our families get involved in the London blitz – caused in some part by the British – it is alleged they started it by bombing cities, but this

was probably Hitler’s revenge for the RAF bombing Berlin because he had declared that NO British bombers would ever be able to reach Berlin. One of the other families get involved in the Nazi practice of killing off all disabled children and adults to save money looking after them – Jewish children receiving priority of course.

Stalin refused to believe that Hitler would invade Russia until he had defeated Britain, despite intelligence reports to the contrary, so when Germany did invade they were wholly unprepared and the German army swept through Russia as far as the outskirts of Moscow, before the Russian winter saved them again.

Other events featured in the story include Pearl Harbour and the last days of the war in Berlin. The politics after the war finished and the Berlin airlift, the Marshall plan and how Russia got its own nuclear bomb

A thoroughly good, absorbing read and I look forward to the last book of the triology.

Ken Follett - Eye of the Needle

 review written and read live on the show by Brian Lowen 12th June 2014

This is the first novel produced by KF that really made his name.

The story is set during the second world war, coming up to D Day when the allied armies were preparing to invade France. Obviously it was important to keep secret the invasion plans and where the landings would be made on the coast of Europe.

In order to fool the Germans into thinking the invasion would be made across the straits of Dover into Calais a big deception was launched. A complete army was built in East Anglia. It looked like an army from the air but it was actually just shells of barrack huts and rubber pump up tanks and aircraft made out of plywood.

MI5 is tasked with eliminating any German spies in England that might have discovered this big deception and they were very successful, but one escaped their notice. This was a master spy, a personal friend of Hitler, who went under the code name of Die Nadal – the Needle. He had arrived in England in 1939 and taken up lodgings in London from where he could transmit messages back to Germany. He was known as Faber in England and spoke good English and used his time before the war started to perfect his accent and knowledge of the language.

He is tasked by Hitler to check on this army build up in Norfolk. And so he makes his way there and discovers the truth about the phantom forces and takes a reel of film to prove it.

He is discovered and has to kill several home guard people and this alerts MI5 to the fact that a spy is on the ground in this restricted area.

And so the hunt is on to catch him before he can get his film back to Germany. The chase is thrilling as he makes his way up to Scotland where he is due to be picked up by a U Boat off the east coast near Aberdeen.

The story reaches its thrilling climax on a remote island off the coast of Scotland which has just two cottages, one inhabited by a family comprising a disabled husband with his wife and young son plus an old shepherd living in the other cottage at the other end of the island.

The climax is very thrilling, raising your heart beat, as you empathise with the characters and will them on to succeed, and you can see why this book was such a great success and led KF on to write so many more great stories.

The story about the spy is fictional but the rest is fact and the Nazis were duped into thinking the invasion would be across the Dover Straits.

A great book, thoroughly recommended.

 

Peter Watt - Cry of the Curlew

  reviewed live on bookshow by Brian Lowen 18th July 2013
 

This is a long saga of a story set in Australia in the 1800’s when the country was growing from the original penal settlements into a new vibrant nation.

The story involves the continued feuding between two families – the Macintosh and the Duffy families and the book starts with the brutal dispersal of the aboriginal tribe from the property of the prosperous landowner Donald Macintosh. This is genocide at its worst and we are not spared the gory details.

Meanwhile, in thriving Sydney town the Duffy family are unaware of the involvement of some of their members in this brutal dispersal and this leads to the start of the bitter feud lasting over several generations of the two families.

I cannot hope to summarise the story as it is very complicated involving many people but it is easy to follow and includes all the right ingredients of a good story – action, drama, romance, sex, and historical interest.

I found it really interesting as it gives you a good idea what life was like in the early days of the formation of the Australian nation – life in the sun-baked outback compared to the rumbustious life in the new townships where class distinction was very marked

between the rich upper class and the poor immigrants eking out a living in  cramped insanitary hovels in the townships.

This is the first part of a trilogy and I am already into the second book as I enjoyed the first book so much. I found it equally as good as Ken Follett’s current trilogy.

Thoroughly recommended.

Simon Mawer - The Girl who fell from the Sky

reviewed live on bookshow by Brian Lowen on 29th august 2013

Marian Sutro is half French and half British, and as she speaks fluent French she is recruited  by the British Secret Service to go undercover in France during the second world war.

The story takes us through all her training in a remote house in Scotland before she is finally accepted as being suitable to be an agent working with the Resistance in France.

She soon finds herself parachuting into south-west France, having been trained in sabotage, how to perform under interrogation and how to kill.

Her real destination, however is occupied Paris, where she must seek out an old family friend, Clement Pelleteir, a nuclear Physicist, whose expertise is in urgent need back in England.

She makes contact with the local resistance group and arranges drops of supplies from England. She eventually gets to Paris and finds Clement and also Yvette, with whom she trained back in England. The group that she was part of in Paris have all been captured, so Marian tries to arrange for her to escape back to England with Clement, who has agreed to go.

The story gives a good idea what life must have been like in occupied Paris with very little food to eat and always looking behind you to check if you were being followed. You are not able to trust anyone and Marian has to use her training in how to kill.  Life was much easier in the countryside where at least you had reasonable food, but all life’s little luxuries had disappeared.

A good story, but it did not grip me as much as similar stories by other authors on this subject, ie Ken Follett and Leslie Thomas.

Ken Follett - A Place Called Freedom

Book reviewed on bookshow by Brian Lowen 19th Dec 2013

Another wonderful long saga from KF. This time the story is set in the 1700s

Our hero is  Mack McAsh, a charismatic rebel coalminer who has the courage to stand up for his rights against the brutal mine owners who force them to work long hours underground in terrible conditions.

Our heroine is Lizzie Hallim, an independent and rebellious girl who is engaged to Jay Jamisson, the son of the ruthless owner of the mine and heir to a large business empire.

Born into separate worlds, Mack and Lizzie are continually thrown together throughout the story.

Mack becomes an enemy of the state and is forced to flee his homeland. Lizzie aids his escape and they both finish up on the other side of the Atlantic on a tobacco plantation in Virginia. Lizzie is the wife of the new owner of the plantation, Jay, while Mack is a convict slave working on the land.

And so we follow their turbulent relationship as Mack seeks his freedom in the New World.

KF has obviously done a lot of research for this novel because we learn a lot about life on a tobacco plantation in the new colony and also how life treated the rich and the poor in London at this time.

A magnificent novel that you will not want to put down once started.