A Column of Fire

July 17, 2017
Treasonous plots, family rifts, and international political intrigue abound in the third installment of Follett’s (Pillars of the Earth) Kingsbridge series of historical dramas. In the middle of 16th-century England, Kingsbridge Cathedral stands above a town divided by religious conflict. Queen “Bloody Mary” Tudor is killing Protestants. When 18-year-old nobleman Ned Willard loses his sweetheart Margery and his family’s importing business to Margery’s upward-climbing Catholic family after the queen condemns them for being pro-Protestant, he decides to join Protestant Princess Elizabeth Tudor’s secret service. Ned and Margery’s love for each other sustains itself despite decades and miles apart, but can it survive their ideological differences? This sweeping epic delivers suspense, history, and romance in equally satisfying, if sometimes heavy-handed, measures. Follett makes use of multiple winding plotlines and optimistic characters equipped to see any battle through to the end. The novel is an immersive journey through the tumultuous world of 16th-century Europe and some of the bloodiest religious wars in history. Follett’s sprawling novel is a fine mix of heart-pounding drama and erudite historicism.

Narrator John Lee returns to Kingsbridge, the fictitious English city of Ken Follett's historical fiction epics based in the Middle Ages. Now in the shadow of Martin Luther's Reformation and Bloody Mary's persecution of heretics in the mid-sixteenth century, the Willard and Fitzgerald families find themselves on opposite sides of the struggle between Protestants and Catholics. Lee capably portrays a wide cast of characters--from the furiously righteous Rollo, who murders in the name of God, to the quietly confident French woman, Sylvie, who risks her life to distribute Bibles. But the most remarkable aspect of this intense historical novel is the narrative suspense created by Follett as disruption sweeps across Europe, and Lee's talent for crisp, rich narration does it justice. N.M.C. � AudioFile 2017, Portland, Maine