A review by olonion
A Column of Fire, by Ken Follett
2.0
ENOUGH of Ken Follet for a while now.
I can't say I've enjoyed this book. It's way too long, with way too many historical events (Guy Fawkes, really?) and way too many unimportant characters, and I didn't even care about them.
If I were to compare Pillars of the Earth's and World Without End's characters with A Column of Fire ones, I would find the exact same stereotypical 'extremely good' or 'extremely evil' character from this book that had actually already appeared in PotE and/or WWE:
The stupid Rollo is a mix of Alfred and William in Pillars and Ralph in World.
The evil manipulative Piere is Waleran in Pillars and Godwyn in World.
The 'I will fight for love' female (obviously female, it's aaaaaaalways a woman in the stereotype) Sylvia and Margery (who, mind you, are basically the same and are aimed for the same purpose: Ned) are a copy of Aliena in Pillars and Gwenda in World.
The problem is, Pillars had Prior Philip as a deep and really interesting character, and World had the wonderful and free-spirited Caris.
A Column of Fire has no one at all.
I can't say I've enjoyed this book. It's way too long, with way too many historical events (Guy Fawkes, really?) and way too many unimportant characters, and I didn't even care about them.
If I were to compare Pillars of the Earth's and World Without End's characters with A Column of Fire ones, I would find the exact same stereotypical 'extremely good' or 'extremely evil' character from this book that had actually already appeared in PotE and/or WWE:
The stupid Rollo is a mix of Alfred and William in Pillars and Ralph in World.
The evil manipulative Piere is Waleran in Pillars and Godwyn in World.
The 'I will fight for love' female (obviously female, it's aaaaaaalways a woman in the stereotype) Sylvia and Margery (who, mind you, are basically the same and are aimed for the same purpose: Ned) are a copy of Aliena in Pillars and Gwenda in World.
The problem is, Pillars had Prior Philip as a deep and really interesting character, and World had the wonderful and free-spirited Caris.
A Column of Fire has no one at all.