Laila (USA: CA) (2008/09/30): Very significant to todays banking problems Fred S. (USA: PA) (2009/02/03): Excellent reading. Good plot, fast. Jeremy (USA: OR) (2011/11/08): Good Follett, but not great. I found the story to be very predictable at each and every stage, but maybe that's because I've read too much Follett. The characters here are a bit contrived and tend too much toward good or evil, not a lot of grey area in between.
With that said, it was riveting and full of action, adventure, romance, and sex. I'd consider it to be a poor man's version of Follett's more fully developed historical epics, Fall of Giants and Pillars of the Earth. I couldn't help but continually thinking "Dynasty" and "Dallas" while reading this, even though the setting predates those shows by over a century.
