World Without End

Overview

Ken Follett has 90 million readers worldwide. The Pillars of the Earth is his bestselling book of all time. Now, eighteen years after the publication of The Pillars of the Earth, Ken Follett has written the most-anticipated sequel of the year--World Without End.

In 1989 Ken Follett astonished the literary world with The Pillars of the Earth, a sweeping epic novel set in twelfth-century England centered on the building of a cathedral and many of the hundreds of lives it affected. Critics were overwhelmed--"it will hold you, fascinate you, surround you" (Chicago Tribune)--and readers everywhere hoped for a sequel.

World Without End takes place in the same town of Kingsbridge, two centuries after the townspeople finished building the exquisite Gothic cathedral that was at the heart of The Pillars of the Earth. The cathedral and the priory are again at the center of a web of love and hate, greed and pride, ambition and revenge, but this sequel stands on its own. This time the men and women of an extraordinary cast of characters find themselves at a crossroad of new ideas-- about medicine, commerce, architecture, and justice. In a world where proponents of the old ways fiercely battle those with progressive minds, the intrigue and tension quickly reach a boiling point against the devastating backdrop of the greatest natural disaster ever to strike the human race--the Black Death.

Three years in the writing, and nearly eighteen years since its predecessor, World Without End breathes new life into the epic historical novel and once again shows that Ken Follett is a masterful author writing at the top of his craft.

Editorial Reviews

Eighteen years after Pillars of the Earth weighed in with almost 1,000 pages of juicy historical fiction about the construction of a 12th-century cathedral in Kingsbridge, England, bestseller Follett returns to 14th-century Kingsbridge with an equally weighty tome that deftly braids the fate of several of the offspring of Pillars' families with such momentous events of the era as the Black Death and the wars with France. Four children, who will become a peasant's wife, a knight, a builder and a nun, share a traumatic experience that will affect each of them differently as their lives play out from 1327 to 1361. Follett studs the narrative with gems of unexpected information such as the English nobility's multilingual training and the builder's technique for carrying heavy, awkward objects. While the novel lacks the thematic unity of Pillars, readers will be captivated by the four well-drawn central characters as they prove heroic, depraved, resourceful or mean. Fans of Follett's previous medieval epic will be well rewarded. (Oct.)
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-- PUBLISHERS WEEKLY.

Author Information

Bio of Ken Follett

Well known as a writer of international best sellers, Ken Follett was born in Wales and began his career as a newspaper reporter in Wales and in London. His first bestselling novel, The Eye of the Needle, won the Edgar Award and was adapted as a film starring Kate Nelligan and Donald Sutherland. He followed this success with four more bestselling thrillers - Triple, The Key to Rebecca, The Man from St Petersburg, and Lay Down with Lions. His novel, Pillars of the Earth, departed from the thriller genre and was on the New York Times bestseller list for 18 weeks. It also reached the number one position on lists in Canada, Great Britain, and Italy, and was on Germany's bestseller list for six years. He followed Pillars of the Earth with Night over Water, A Dangerous Fortune, and A Place Called Freedom, before returning to the writing of thrillers with The Third Twin, a scorching suspense novel. Miniseries rights to this book were sold to CBS for $1,400,000. The series, starring Kelly McGillis and Larry Hagman, was broadcast in November of 1997. In November of 1998, Follett published The Hammer of Eden, another suspense story. Ken Follett is married to Barbara Follett, who is the Member of Parliament for Stevenage in Hertfordshire. He is a lover of Shakespeare and an amateur musician who plays bass guitar in a band called Damn Right I Got the Blues. He is also chair of the National Year of Reading 1998-99, a British government initiative to raise literacy levels, president of the Dyslexia Institute, and a council member of the National Literacy Trust.

Customer Reviews

• 

  Posted November 17, 2007 by Anna, Germany

  EXCELLENT! Ken Follett was able to breathe life back into Kingsbridge with completely new characters. The writing style did not change drastically. If you have read and liked The Pillars of the Earth, then you will also enjoy World Without End. Lots of great characters and action.

• World Without End

  Posted January 12, 2008 by Candace Weiss, Carlsbad, CA

  Ken Follett has written yet another page turner. It starts about two hundred years after The Pillars of the Earth and it is staged in the same village. It is such a good book that I had a hard time putting this down. I had already read The Pillars of the Earth when it first came out so I was excited about reading this book. It did not disappoint me, rather it was better than The Pillars of the Earth. You really feel for all of the characters and it made you feel that you where right there with all of the town members. It was a thrilling story to read and I was sorry to put it down when I was finished reading this lovely book.

• wonderful read

  Posted December 28, 2008 by mary yevremov, windsor

  fascinating characters,interesting plots.......the story draws you in and when you put the book down your looking forward to getting back...certainly one of my favourite books

• Great read!

  Posted January 21, 2009 by Erika , Monroe

  This book was an excellent sequel to "The Pillars of the Earth". It was easy to get involved in the story, which takes place 200 years after the first book ends. I was completely immersed in the lives of the new characters, and found it hard to put it down. It was a very satisfying read, although I wished it could have gone on forever. Anyone who liked the first book, will love this one as well.

• World Without End

  Posted February 01, 2009 by Michelle, Fresno, Ca

  This book was a very good sequel to The Pillars of the Earth and I really enjoyed reading it. On the other hand, I thought that it followed Pillars a little too closely in that it seemed to be too similar to the first book and just the characters had really changed. Despite that, it was still a very good book and I would still recommend it to other people.

• excellent sequell to Pillars of the Earth

  Posted March 18, 2009 by Frank, Williamsburg, Va

  Fantastic book. This is a book on the insight of life in the 14th century. It will provide the reader with a lasting understanding of how our laws were started and handed down through the centuries.
  A dynamic read. Better understood if you read Pillars of the Earth first.
  

• must read!!!!!!!!!!!1

  Posted March 29, 2009 by Teresa, Greensboro, NC

  Not only does Ken Follett capture your interest in the 1300's he draws you into the life and politics of the time. I hated for it to end. I loved all the characters and felt like I was with them till the end.

• how long do we have to wait for the next one

  Posted April 03, 2009 by bookworm, toronto

  I thought about giving this a 4 star rating because it isn't as good as Pillars of the Earth, but that would be unfair. This is still an exceptional book in its own right. It's too bad it takes Mr. Follet so many years to crank out these epics.

• Another hit for Ken Follet

  Posted April 14, 2009 by metrogirl, Middle Village

  Having read The Pillars of the Earth I could not imagine that the follow-up book could meet my expectations of this first read but I found that I was once again rapt with the comings and goings of the villagers of Kinsbridge. I found that there were a lot of similarities in this books characters to those of Pillars of the Earth but the plot was definitely different and had me once again rooting for the good guys to prevail over the hardships that were constantly thrown their way. Great read!

• I positively loved this book

  Posted April 20, 2009 by Steven E. Savage, West Orange, New Jersey

  The characters were very richly developed and intricate. I found myself constantly surprised when they would take characteristic behaviors to the extreme. Every chapter, and in fact every word, brought my interest level up even higher; I could not put it down. I worried that reading the sequel to "Pillars of the Earth" (one of my all-time favorite books) would only disappointment. I had enjoyed the characters in "Pillars" to such a great extent that I worried that I could never love the new sequel characters to the same extent. I was wrong. Follett's solid story-telling, tremendous character development, and excellent command of history gave me a book into which I had NO trouble sinking my teeth. I hope he continues the series...

• Even Better than Pillars of the Earth

  Posted May 10, 2009 by Patty Davidson, Mississauga, Ontario

  Absolutely engrossing from beginning to end. I couldn't put it down! The book is so well written that you feel like a spectator transported through time. You are there!
  The book is well researched and provides an insightful and accurate depiction of 12th century life. The surprising conclusion is that despite our technology nothing much has changed about the human condition. Definite must read!

Additional Info

Imprint

Penguin Group, Inc.

Filesize

2.22 MB

Number of Pages

1024

eBook ISBN

9781429543644