England Is Not Normal

The book on tape I'm listening to is The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. I didn't even think about that when I downloaded Ken Follet's Eye Of The Needle. I guess I should have. I could very soon start suffering from Nazi overload. Then again, I do get to see the war from several different angles.

That being said, here is the first line and first passage from that book.

"IT WAS THE COLDEST WINTER FOR FORTY-FIVE YEARS. Villages in the English countryside were cut off by the snow and the Thames froze over. One day in January the Glasgow-London train arrived at Euston twenty-four hours late. The snow and the blackout combined to make motoring perilous; road accidents doubled, and people told jokes about how it was more risky to drive an Austin Seven along Piccadilly at night than to take a tank across the Siegfried Line."

Follett, Ken - Eye Of The Needle

I like the way he tells the reader that things are not normal without immediately talking about The Blitz. It's other things around England that are not normal as well, then later the reader hears about the war. As is usual, the book continues to get better with each page.

First Line of Second in a Series

I'm in a "series" mood. For a while I was in a "committment book" mood. I was reading huge tomes like Les Miserables, any Charles Dickens book, Dune, etc etc. Right now I'm hungry for series. I started with Harry Potter, then The Sacketts, and right now I'm reading WEB Griffen's Corps Series. I'm on book 2. I just started book two, and I have to say the first line is not incredibly intriguing. 

It's a fun series, and in fact I like most series because you get to know the characters so well. 

First in the Trilogy

My new best friend, B, recommended a book for me. B likes long winding novels with lots of plots all going on at the same time. I'm happy for the recommendation, Ken Follet's Fall of Giants.

I've been a fan of Follet's for years. I read The Pillars of The Earth way back in my early twenties I believe. I've read and reviewed several of Follet's books since starting this blog five or six years back (see here).

Fall of Giants was a lot of fun to read but it certainly is the beginning of something much much longer. It reads like just the introduction for a larger story. That's low hanging fruit to predict since the entire Century Trilogy has already been published, but I'm looking forward to Winter of the World.

My favorite parts were not the descriptions of trench warfare on the Western Front, which were fun to read, nor were my favorite parts the story lines about turn of the century British nobility, a la Downtown Abbey. Not even the secret love affair between Maud and Walter, which I thought was well weaved, my favorite part to read. The portions of the book that called to me the most were those that dealt with the Eastern Front and the Bolshevik Revolution.

I remember taking a Russian History class back in college. What I liked about this story was that it simplified and made the Bolshevik Revolution understandable. Follet uses a foil, Grigori, to show how the revolution took shape and to show the reader how Trotsky and Lenin were able to take power. Easily the most interesting parts of the novel.

If you enjoy long, historical novels with winding story lines like a soap opera, then this is a great book for that. Can't wait for book two!

First Line from Night Over Water

One of the things I don't like about reading books on Kindle is that there are times when I wonder if the conversion from text to electronic messed up. Here's a perfect example in Ken Follet's Night Over Water.

I was the most romantic plan ever built. 

I'm wondering if "it" was supposed to be that first word. Despite it all, I was hardly moved to read on with that first line, however Follet has substantial capital with me based on his other works. 

Book Review of Eye of the Needle

Much better than Hornet Flight and far better than The Man From St. Petersburg, that's the quick summation of Eye of the Needle.



I remember in one of the writing classes I took we discussed what makes a thriller and what makes a mystery. That instructor said that Dick Francis wrote mysteries. I've heard others say that they are thrillers. This one instructor said that Thrillers need to deal with subjects that are grand in scale and possibly Earth-shaking. The Man From St. Petersburg, Hornet Flight and The Pillars of the Earth all lacked this grandiose scale. Eye of the Needle made up for what the others lacked and made the novel better than the others if only for that reason.

Another thing that Ken Follet's books demonstrate is how great novels are based on good characterization not great plots. You can have both, but without great characters you can't have a great book. Eye of the Needle, as so many of Follet's novels, is filled with terrific characters.

I marked one passage:

"It is for places like this that the word "bleak" has been invented. The island is a J-shaped lump of rock rising sullenly out of the North Sea. It lies on the map like the top half of a broken cane, parallel with the Equator but a long, long way north; its curved handle toward Aberdeen, its broken, jagged stump pointing threateningly at distant Denmark. It is ten miles long. Around most of its coast the cliffs rise out of the cold sea without the courtesy of a beach. Angered by this rudeness the waves pound on the rock in impotent rage; a ten-thousand-year fit of bad temper that the island ignores with impunity."

I loved the book and can't wait to read another from Follet.