Review contains SPOILERS. Don't read further if you don't want some plot details spoiled.Are you a self important baby boomer who leans left in your political views? Well buddy, are you going to have the biggest rager of a boner reading this book. Don't get me wrong, I devoured this book, and it starts off very strong. Most of the characters in the book start off likable. I realized pretty early on that at this point in the story, nearly all the characters are related by either blood or marriage, despite being on 3 different continents. Remember how likable most of the characters in both of the first two books were? The strong women? The men up against these terrible World Wars but still fighting the good fight for their familes? Yeah, you sort of get that at the start of the book, but it doesn't last.As some other reviewers have noted, the book does start off strong, but then sort of just starts jumping from one historic event to the next, all while glossing over or downplaying some important ones. Nixon, Reagan and the one right leaning character in the book are evil cartoon characters. Jimmy Carter is almost completely left out(I wonder why?). Some redeeming qualities are shown for Nixon, just before getting into the things he's known for. None such for the Gipper, but I think part of that is that the story starts to go off the rails a bit in the 80's. Vietnam was pretty glossed over earlier, and I shit you not, there is not a single mention of the Soviet war in Afghanistan, despite there being two POV characters based out of the USSR and the theme of the USSR losing money and status being a central theme of the later chapters. How is that sort of oversight possible? As for Nam, most of the characters in the story are affluent, so they didn't have to fight. One character gets drafted, and it's a bit of a stretch, and he spends all of about 2 pages in Nam. Those are some of the most forced pages in the entire book and of course Follett goes all BABYKILLER for those pages, and no real mention is made of them again. Another character goes over there and pulls a Jane Fonda. The portions about Nam can somewhat be forgiven from a "boots on the ground" POV stance, as Follett is never at his strongest when discussing combat. However, the absolute omission of the Soviet Afghan war is a really glaring mistake.In the earlier books, Follett's strength was his human characters, and the terrible situations they're thrown in. Despite all odds, they always pull through, usually with the help/support of a strong family. These are families we've read about for 3 generations or more. It seems, that much like in real life, something was lost between the Greatest Generation and the Baby Boomers. This is both a good thing, in that Follett acknowledges that the family did indeed grow weaker in that time period, and a bad thing as most of the characters are terrible people. Remember Maud? How she loved her man so strongly, that she gave up her family and homeland to be with him? She loved him through two world wars, and stayed strong for her new and growing family. Well, her grandson(SPOILERS) becomes a degenerate, drug addicted rockstar, who sleeps with his best friend's girl. His best friend(also his cousin), decides that this girl is fucking marriage material. Cheat on me and not feel bad about it? That's cool. Enable my cousin's heroin addiction? That's also cool, because I love you. Sounds like the kind of gal you'd want your son to marry right? Oh, that wonderful young lady is also a POV character, ha ha. That's a theme among the male characters in this book. All of them, without fail, are fucking chumps. Almost all of them are either cheated on, cheat themselves, or end up making some choices that require a bit of a leap on the readers part. For instance (SPOILERS), a male character digs one of the female POV characters, but she falls for none other Jack Kennedy. He's such a fucking dreamboat that the bitch doesn't get married until she's 60, withered up, and a literal cat lady. The Kennedy clan in general are portrayed as the polar opposites to the cartoonish Nixon and Reagan. Very little mention is made of Ted, the fat drunk Kennedy, I guess Follett couldn't quite whitewash him into a completely flattering light. Another character(more SPOILERS), one of the more redeeming ones, decides to cheat on her disabled husband with another man. Her poor disabled, mostly impotent husband say it's all good. Why? Because it's 60's MAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNN. She just as quickly ends the affair. It's almost as if Follett put that in there to ruin the one completely likable character in the story.So, you're probably thinking that I really disliked this book from that review, but that's untrue. It was an entertaining read, and a page turner. It starts off very strongly and I had hoped it would be as enjoyable at the first two, but the enjoyment I got from the middle and end portions of the book came more from Follett's obvious bias and the reverse-Jamie Lannister character arcs of the POV characters. If you have read the first two books, definitely read this one to see how it ends, but I must warn you...the ending is terrible. I mean, I groaned as soon as I saw the date posted at the top of the page. I'll put another spoiler tag below and then discuss it, because it's the funniest, most ironic bit for me.ENDING SPOILERSSo, as I mentioned earlier, Follett spends some time building all of the right leaning characters into these evil cartoon characters. Early in the story it's(and rightfully so) the segregationists, then Nixon, and lastly Reagan. Now, for Reagan, he asserts that he's even worse than Tricky Dick, and that he got away with murdering innocents during the Iran-Contra affair. So what does Follett end on? You guessed it, the 2008 Barack Obama acceptance speech. For the scene, Follett has all of the black characters, who have fought so hard for civil rights throughout the first part of the book, all in one room watching the whole thing. Never mind that only Jacky and her son George are the only characters you care about in the room. They have reached the top of the mountain! I guess Follett wanted to stop it there and not have the parts where Obama wins the Nobel peace prize, and then murders innocents with drones. Hey, he'll get away with it though, the Gipper would be proud!Edit: I would also like to add another glaring omission from a book that tried to hit all the big moments of the 60's-80's. The moon landing! The entire space race was barely mentioned, but one of the biggest "Where were you at" moments, and arguably one of the greatest achievements in the history of mankind, the FUCKING MOON LANDING, was not even in the books. Not even a fucking mention!
For me the book "Edge of Eternity" quivers and quakes under its own weight, and this is coming from a huge Ken Follett fan. Most of what makes his novels so great is the immersive quality and the suspense, along with wicked plot turns. Since the five intertwining narratives in Edge of Eternity are all based on historical events, there goes the suspense. Is it immersive? At times.Much of the first half of the book centers around George Jakes (son of Jacky Jakes and Greg Peshkov) and his attempts to romance two different women as he begins his legal career at the dawning of the Civil Rights struggle. There are pages of text given to the Martin Luther King "I have a dream" speech but while reading, I kept thinking are two fresh law school graduates really going to start as a member of a member of Bobby Kennedy's inner circle and a close adviser to Martin Luther King?My favorite family and story of the Century series actually starts off the text in Edge of Eternity when Rebecca Franck, daughter of Carla and Werner falls into trouble with the Stasi, the East German police. At the same time her younger brother Walli is trying to find fame as a singer and guitar player. Some of the best moments in Edge of Eternity happen after the Berlin Wall gets built and both Rebecca and her boyfriend Bernd try to escape and at a different time Walli and his girlfriend Karolin also try to escape. Lots of nice little ends get tied together the way they always do in third books of trilogies. It's a little overly convenient that so many of the characters from the five different families end up as major players in so many different huge historical events, like Forrest Gump times five. There is a gratuitously violent section that takes place in Vietnam which shows some ugly violence, even by Ken Follett standards (he has had flaying scenes in his books before along with Nazi's breaking a poor 18 year old boy's bones with a sledgehammer). Yes, we know that some horrible things went on in Vietnam but the scene still seems wedged in for shock value.The Cuban Missile crisis, Watergate, and other significant events get pages upon pages of dry description of all the details and machinations. This might be useful for a student to know but the detached quality of the passages made them seem tiresome to me (by the end of the book I was skipping over them). Ken Follett's villains are often memorable because they are so vivid and multi dimensional, such as Aleks Kschessinsky (Man from St. Petersburg), Dieter (Jackdaws), Priest (Hammer of Eden) and several others. Yet in Edge of Eternity the one true villain, Stasi agent Hans Hoffman seems more like a pathetic dweeb while ultra right-wing Cam Dewar is just boring and predictable. I skimmed over all passages with Cam in them, which was almost the entire Watergate section.Edge of Eternity and the whole Century trilogy could go on to become important reads to learn about 20th century events. In fact it would make sense if they ended up on some high school or college reading lists. But for Ken Follett's fans, well we're used to something that evokes a much higher emotional response that's populated with characters we love or hate, not just get annoyed with.So "Edge" is worthwhile and finishes the Century trilogy nicely but now that he has gotten those 3,000 words of his desk maybe Ken can go back to writing a smaller scope book that's closer in quality to Pillars of the Earth or A Dangerous Fortune.
What do You think about Edge Of Eternity (2014)?
A trilogia do século do Ken Follett começou de forma brilhante com A Queda dos Gigantes. Continuou na mesma nota com o Inverno do Mundo. E, infelizmente No Limiar da Eternidade cumpriu efectivamente parte do seu título, ficou-se no limiar. Os dois primeiros livros desta trilogia tiveram do seu lado a vantagem de representarem curtos períodos de tempo que foram dominados por grandes acontecimentos, tais como a Primeira e Segunda Guerra Mundial. Neste terceiro volume, o autor tentou, de forma pouco conseguida, abranger um período de tempo de quase 30 anos, de forma superficial, apressada e desconexada, o que não aconteceu nos volumes anteriores. As personagens com que nos deparamos não tem qualquer força nem interesse e além disso, parece que levamos uma grande aula de política intensiva, que se baseia sobretudo na opinião do autor, discorrendo assim de forma não imparcial.Ficamos com uma sensação de ficar a mastigar durante imenso tempo a mesma situação e torna-se efectivamente uma "eternidade" ler este livro. Por todas estas razões, deixei este livro. Não consegui continuar a arrastar-me mais, porque pretendo chegar à eternidade, de outra forma. Perdoe-me o autor, porque houve outros livros que gostei bastante mas este não me pareceu muito bem conseguido, de todo. Parece-me que foi estritamente escrito para cumprir prazos editoriais. Uma tentativa de despejar conhecimento forçado.É uma pena. Como referi, os dois primeiros livros, são concisos nas matérias a que se referem. Conseguem nos agarrar dessa forma. E se calhar, aqui entra também o meu gosto pessoal por certas épocas da nossa História, nomeadamente a 1º, mas sobretudo a 2ª Guerra Mundial. Tristemente, finda assim esta trilogia. E se títulos houvessem para dar a este volume, seria sem dúvida, a queda do gigante.
—André
4.5 starsEdge of Eternity is Follett's bookend to his globe-trotting Century trilogy that began with Fall of Giants followed by Winter of the World: a strikingly immense multi-generational saga featuring families from Germany, Russia, Wales, England and America, weaving historical world conflicts of the 20th century.In this final installment, we see the grandchildren of the epic WWI story course through the remnants of WWII, the Cold War, and the civil rights movement of the 1960's. Follett's undertaking of the political crises of the next 3 decades, steered ahead by the superpowers of the world, range from Communism, Social Democracy, freedom and civil rights, the threat of nuclear annihilation, espionage and government corruption, weaving them with creativity, astute interpretation and insight.The bulky novel is made highly readable by short chapters ending in enough suspense to drive the reader through a labyrinthine historical journey: a bus tour meandering through the seminal events that shaped the world of today. The most compelling of topics unfolded right here in America with the move for civil rights laws: issues which the Brothers Kennedy initially hesitated on while turning blind eyes to the violence waged on black people in the South.Follett's mostly plausible characters are involved in real events, interacting with real world leaders; there are unmistakable characters resembling Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, 'Hanoi' Jane Fonda and The Beatles. I say 'mostly plausible' since I had one teeny issue with Maria Summers, JFK's mistress: a strong black woman who was one of the Freedom Riders, who stands firmly for equality for black people, goes to bed and falls hopelessly in love with the white American president who refused to sign the bill for civil rights. I had the impression of the black female captive of a white plantation 'massa'. She stood out as a character out of character.Finally, this epic fact and fiction heavyweight is a story of victory: of freedom and democracy after a century of earth's bloodshed; the realization that was once a Dream - the attainment of civil rights after such violent struggle, culminating into the making of America's first black President; the failure of communism, the fall of corrupt world leaders and - not to be left unmentioned - the triumphant heralding of the birth of Rock and Roll. All we are saying is give peace a chance.Let me tell you nowEv'rybody's talking aboutRevolution, evolution, masturbation,Flagellation, regulation, integrations,Meditations, United Nations,Congratulations. - John Lennon
—Nicole~
At first my opinion was more critical. The characters were too 'close to the action'. George is a close adviser to RFK. Dimka is a close adviser to Brezhnev. I liked the first two books where the main characters weren't comically 'in the room' where huge events took place, yet were impacted by those events. But the end results of the first two novels were upward mobility, so I began to accept the movement and plot devices of this last book.I liked the East Berlin and Russian plots more than the American plots, but I'm an american so I'm more familiar with the history that took place here, the opinions and reactions at the time. I think Follett does a good job summarizing complex history, and had me constantly searching wikipedia after reading a chapter to find out more background on the historic events and characters.I found it odd that characters were dropped out. Like Erik Von Ulrich (Carla's brother), and Werner's sister and family.
—Ed
