Jillian's review

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Copy/paste the text below into your blog. <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5064.World_Without_End?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="World Without End" border="0" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51WkM8hoqrL._SL160_.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5064.World_Without_End?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">World Without End</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/3447.Ken_Follett">Ken Follett</a><br/><br/> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/11104768?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a> rating: 3 of 5 stars<br/>I got this book for Christmas and was so excited to start. I was a big fan of Pillars and figured I would love this as well. I liked it a whole lot, but definitely not as much as Pillars. The story was familiar (and at points almost a retread of Pillars). It was often anachronistic - especially the character of Caris. I loved her and I'm all for feminism and strong female characters, but it made me wonder how accurate and believable she really was. Clunky prose such as "she would have been alderman, but women didn't usually hold that position" didn't help matters. Nor the fact that Follet repeated that sentiment over and over again. Other reviews have correctly pointed out that there is something squirm-inducing about the way Follet seems to relish his descriptions of rape and pillage. He also has the annoying habit of annotating "memories" that the character has, so that every time he or she recalls something, he has to identify it for the reader and give the back-story again. It becomes laughably repetitive, and only goes to show that the book is way too long if he can't trust that the reader can follow along and remember. All in all, a good read, but definitely not one that I couldn't put down and not one that I loved as much as its predecessor. <br/><br/><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/80302?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>