2018-03-14
This is a decent book that does a great job of teaching Elizabethan history by proxy – but it somewhat falls flat when it comes to making the experience feel real through the characters.
Follet’s plotting is often masterful – covering the rise, reign, and aftermath of Elizabeth I via a dozen POV characters in 4 countries is a genuine achievement.
But all too often the settings felt thin, with little engagement of the senses. Characters too often fell flat, with Follet far too reliant on telling us what people thought and felt, rather than showing us.
I was also left uncomfortable at the casual way Follet used rape simply a means to show us a male character was a bad man. Too often he wrote villains as caricatures rather than characters.
Overall, a book with amazing breadth but limited depth. And while I can say that I genuinely enjoyed the story – hence the 4 stars – I couldn’t help but feel sometimes it was a little rushed, and there was an opportunity lost to come up with another masterpiece.
Rating: 4/5