HomeGroupsTalkMoreZeitgeist
Search Site
This site uses cookies to deliver our services, improve performance, for analytics, and (if not signed in) for advertising. By using LibraryThing you acknowledge that you have read and understand our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. Your use of the site and services is subject to these policies and terms.

Results from Google Books

Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.

World Without End by Ken Follett
Loading...

World Without End (original 2007; edition 2007)

by Ken Follett

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingConversations / Mentions
12,636317484 (4.04)1 / 461
Fiction. Suspense. Thriller. Historical Fiction. HTML:

#1 New York Times Bestseller

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.

World Without End is its equally irresistible sequelâ??set two hundred years after The Pillars of the Earth and three hundred years after the Kingsbridge prequel, The Evening and the Morning.

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 crossroads of new ideasâ??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 raceâ??the Black Death. 

Three years in the writing and nearly eighteen years since its predecessor, World Without End is a "well-researched, beautifully detailed portrait of the late Middle Ages" (The Washington Post) that once again shows that Ken Follett is a masterful author writing at the top of his cr
… (more)

Member:kristine162
Title:World Without End
Authors:Ken Follett
Info:Dutton (2007), Paperback
Collections:Your library
Rating:
Tags:None

Work Information

World Without End by Ken Follett (2007)

Loading...

Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book.

» See also 461 mentions

English (271)  Spanish (11)  French (7)  German (7)  Catalan (5)  Italian (3)  Dutch (3)  Finnish (2)  Hungarian (2)  Portuguese (Brazil) (1)  Swedish (1)  Danish (1)  All languages (314)
Showing 1-5 of 271 (next | show all)
Historical Fiction
  BooksInMirror | Feb 19, 2024 |
(2007)Good writing kept me involved with this probably over-long follow up to the Pillars of the Earth. Kingsbridge in the mid-1300s must deal with corrupt clergy and the plague to survive. Always with the help of several strong women especially Caris and Gwenda. The architect Merthyn Builder is also a central part of the story. When it seems that corruption will prevail, Merthyn uses blackmail threat to the king to finally bring stability to this strong town. KIRKUS REVIEWThe peasants are revolting. Some, anyway. Others¥the good-hearted varlets, churls and nickpurses of Follett's latestÂ¥are just fine.In a departure from his usual taut, economical procedurals (Whiteout, 2004, etc.), Follett revisits the Middle Ages in what amounts to a sort of sequel to The Pillars of the Earth (1989). The story is leisurely but never slow, turning in the shadow of the great provincial cathedral in the backwater of Kingsbridge, the fraught construction of which was the ostensible subject of the first novel. Now, in the 1330s, the cathedral is a going concern, populated by the same folks who figured in its making: intriguing clerics, sometimes clueless nobles and salt-of-the-earth types. One of the last is a resourceful young girlÂ¥and Follett's women are always resourceful, more so than the menfolkÂ¥who liberates the overflowing purse of one of those nobles. Her father has already lost a hand for thievery, but that's an insufficient deterrent in a time of hunger, and a time when the lords ?were frequently away: at war, in Parliament, fighting lawsuits, or just attending on their earl or king.? Thus the need for watchful if greedy bailiffs and tough sheriffs, who make Gwenda's grown-up life challenging. Follett has a nice eye for the sometimes silly clash of the classes and the aspirations of the small to become large, as with one aspiring prior who ?had only a vague idea of what he would do with such power, but he felt strongly that he belonged in some elevated position in life.? Alas, woe meets some of those who strive, a fact that touches off a neat little mystery at the beginning of the book, one that plays its way out across the years and implicates dozens of characters.A lively entertainment for fans of The Once and Future King, The Lord of the Rings and other multilayered epics.
  derailer | Jan 25, 2024 |
Not as good as the first book. It drug on too long, but is a good beach read. ( )
  Colleen.Greene | Dec 17, 2023 |
Massive tome with an incredible sprawling story that sometimes falls a bit short of its historical veracity ambitions. King-like framework of a disparate group of kids united by a key event that lingers through the story but never really lives up to the grand reveal it's set up to be. Staggering roster of imminently hateable villains quite literally getting away with murder. Set in a very dynamic time for England and Europe showing how the black death upended social hierarchies and traditions by giving the reader a book's worth each of "before", "during" and "after".
( )
  A.Godhelm | Oct 20, 2023 |
Staggering brilliance; amazing research; great story. ( )
  RickGeissal | Aug 16, 2023 |
Showing 1-5 of 271 (next | show all)
no reviews | add a review

» Add other authors (39 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Follett, Kenprimary authorall editionsconfirmed
AnuvelaTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Grant, Richard E.Narratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
You must log in to edit Common Knowledge data.
For more help see the Common Knowledge help page.
Canonical title
Original title
Alternative titles
Original publication date
People/Characters
Important places
Important events
Related movies
Epigraph
Dedication
For Barbara
First words
Gwenda was eight years old, but she was not afraid of the dark.
Quotations
Last words
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
Disambiguation notice
Please distinguish Ken Follett's original 2007 novel, World Without End from any abridged audio edition of the complete work. Thank you.
5.25 in discs
Publisher's editors
Information from the French Common Knowledge. Edit to localize it to your language.
Blurbers
Original language
Canonical DDC/MDS
Canonical LCC

References to this work on external resources.

Wikipedia in English (2)

Fiction. Suspense. Thriller. Historical Fiction. HTML:

#1 New York Times Bestseller

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.

World Without End is its equally irresistible sequelâ??set two hundred years after The Pillars of the Earth and three hundred years after the Kingsbridge prequel, The Evening and the Morning.

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 crossroads of new ideasâ??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 raceâ??the Black Death. 

Three years in the writing and nearly eighteen years since its predecessor, World Without End is a "well-researched, beautifully detailed portrait of the late Middle Ages" (The Washington Post) that once again shows that Ken Follett is a masterful author writing at the top of his cr

No library descriptions found.

Book description
Haiku summary

Current Discussions

None

Popular covers

Quick Links

Rating

Average: (4.04)
0.5 6
1 45
1.5 6
2 88
2.5 43
3 479
3.5 126
4 1075
4.5 155
5 1011

Is this you?

Become a LibraryThing Author.

 

About | Contact | Privacy/Terms | Help/FAQs | Blog | Store | APIs | TinyCat | Legacy Libraries | Early Reviewers | Common Knowledge | 202,659,987 books! | Top bar: Always visible