Actually 0 stars.

What a woke left wing waste of time.

Unless you feel you the need to be told how to think skip this book. Read Orwell’s “1984” instead.

This is definitely not “The Eye of the Needle” Follett.281 s5 comments Tina 15 6

Sadly not nearly as well written as the previous books in this trilogy. The first third was as we're used to, descriptive and captivating. The rest seemed he was in a hurry to finish, and is rushed and padded with a lot of clumsy sex. Very sad, I was so excited for the at installment and was left wanting better.206 s1 comment Dana Ilie405 385

Ken Follett believes in the power of a good story. And he harbors no doubt about attention spans in an era when people avert their eyes to smartphone screens approximately every 1.2 seconds.
Ken Follett again tackles great chucks of history in Edge of Eternity, the final installment in his Century Trilogy, which covers 1961 through 1989, and includes such epic events as Vietnam, Kennedy’s assassination, the Civil Rights movement, the Cold War and the fall of Communism. Follett also takes on two pop culture issues: the genesis of rock’n roll and the ‘60s sexual revolution.
And one small scene with Nicolae Ceausescu as protagonist. I was a kid but I remember how communism was: the wake up at 4 in the morning for the queues if you wanted to buy something, the fear of expressing yourself freely etc.
Follett tells his stories by placing readers into bedrooms, boardrooms, even at the Berlin Wall as it comes down. He’s masterly at juggling complex plot lines with a mix of real world leaders and fictional characters who are spread throughout Eastern and Western Europe and the United States.
Wrapping up a huge sweeping trilogy can be difficult, but Follett does a great job tying up loose ends, giving justice and time to characters without making it feel too long or fake. Overall, this is a fantastic series and a fantastic novel, and is enjoyable from a purely entertaining read and also as a way to think about the historical events of our recent past through the eyes of different people and perspectives.historical-fiction165 s Greg24

Bleh... I hated this book! What a load of liberal revisionist history.

I can summarize it for you this way: Liberals are brilliant, dashing, successful, all-knowing, always wise and prescient. Conservatives are stumbling, bumbling blockheads, who must visit prostitutes to get any action because who would want a conservative lover?

Want more? Jimmy Carter almost ended the cold war with his brilliant moves regarding Poland. Reagan gave a silly speech telling Gorbachev to "tear down this wall", which apparently had nothing whatsoever to do with the wall a few years thereafter being torn down... and, by the way, he was a mass murderer. In fact, it turned out that Gorbachev himself pretty much unilaterally killed the Soviet Union... on purpose. Who knew?

If you lean liberal and need to have your fantasy world upheld by books where liberals can do no wrong and conservatives can do nothing but, this is definitely the book for you. It will confirm all your most devout beliefs about your world view.

I found it awful... bleh142 s Gasperson2 4

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 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 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 disd 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 SPOILERS

So, 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 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!
87 s Mohammed Arabey709 6,085

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First 2017 Read, as the last 2 years...KEN FOLLETT & The Century Trilogy.
Because who doesn't read History..won't notice how determinedly it repeat itself.
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??? 6 ????? 201771 s Shlomo2

First off, I cannot review this book without spoilers, so please, please read at your own risk.





SPOILERS AHEAD


I was disappointed by this book. Maybe as a standalone version it would have been better received, but as the third of what had been a superb trilogy I was let down.

First:
Why drop so many characters we were invested in the first two books and which in the closing of the second made it look we should look forward to what happens to them? The second books ends with Erik (Carla's brother) being enthusiastic with an East German uniform (similar to how he had joined the Nazi Army before) yet no mention of him, even in passing is made here.

The second book ends with Volodya showing his scientist wife a Sears catalog. Nothing comes of that, and the book focuses on the fraternal twins of Volodya's sister (whose marriage no one was thrilled about).

What about Billy Williams and his family? The seond book ends with him being a leading Labor MP and him digging up Ty Gwyn's gardens for coal.

Second:
No payoffs for many of the characters we do get to follow,

More than once Natalya keeps mentioning that she would to escape to the West and that Vasilii (her author friend) deserves to get the recognition he deserves. Would it have cost too much for Follet to add a 2 page chapter where he receives some accolades (or maybe a fictional Nobel Prize of sorts) once the Soviet Union has been dissolved?

Maud dies, Grigory is visited on his death bed, what about the rest of the characters we loved and hated?

Third:
A heavy political agenda.

Basically liberals are good, conservatives are bad. Reagan should have been punished but wasn't, Bush 41 was clueless. After a point I did not it at all. Follet made one character conservative and made him a heavy cartoon of one.

Fourth:
Many people complained before me, too much pointless sex. Does he really have to tell us that a brother and sister do not mind seeing each other naked? Hiding in a women's lingerie store was a great idea for two women looking not to be followed, but comparing breasts? And that "if I was a lesbian" line? Seriously? Plus the whole thing about Walli shaking hands with Karoly's husband and "seeing something" then Lilli remembering it was absurd.

Those are the things that disappointed me in a book I was soo looking forward to read. Sorry Ken, this onw gets only 3 stars.

And BTW just a passing mention (twice) of how Ty Gwyn is now a College with no explanation?70 s Liviu2,342 656

very strong first part covering roughly 1961 - 1963 (Berlin wall, fight for Civil Rights, the Cuban missile crisis), but then the novel starts scattering and after a while becomes almost an encyclopedia recital of what happens as it follows the diverse group of characters until 1989

there are strong moments here and there but they read more snippets than a novel, while the political biases of the author start becoming way too visible and detract from the book (there is a ton about Nixon and later Reagan and how bad they and their entourage were and outrage as how Nixon got punished but Reagan "got away" with it, while nothing about the disastrous Carter years, very little about the disastrous Johnson Vietnam War, nothing about how Margaret Thatcher reinvigorated Britain for a generation etc); also there is nothing about Japan or China and any historical fiction that wants to cover the later part of the 20th century in the comprehensive way this book seems to be intended and basically resumes itself at the USA-USSR cold war is already failing there

overall a page turner one reads to find out what happens, but which after the first excellent maybe third, devolves into self-indulgence, lack of cohesion and political bias that becomes more and more annoying
2014_release_read mainstream read_201468 s Maria Espadinha1,063 445

O Tyranossaurus Rex


Ufa!... Até que enfim!
No limiar da eternidade fiquei eu depois de ler este calhamaço infinito!
Just kidding! He, he

Será mesmo mandatória uma forte dose de coragem para deglutir este colosso?!
Não creio!
Apesar da desencorajante lombada de lista telefónica, garanto-vos que tem enredo q.b. para não enfastiar.

Só mesmo a mestria de Ken Follet, para tornar um livro com as dimensões dum Tyranossaurus Rex numa leitura fluida e agradável.
Como sempre (quase sempre?!), Ken Follet não desilude!...

Nota: Confesso que concluí este livro há bastante tempo, o que significa que já se me varreram muitos detalhes da trama. Porém, recordo que a sua leitura me marcou pela positiva, e como considero que os bons livros são para divulgar, propus-me resenhá-lo nem que fôsse só para dizer que gostei e vale a pena. E assim fiz!
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