FALL OF GIANTS

FALL OF GIANTS by Ken Follett was read for the Just For Fun Reading Challenge 2011.

From the back of the book:

A thirteen-year-old Welsh boy enters a man's world in the mining pits....An American law student rejected in love finds a surprising new career in Woodrow Wilson's White House....A housekeeper for the aristocratic Fitzherberts takes a fateful step above her station, while Lady Maud Fitzherbert herself crosses deep into forbidden territory when she falls in love with a German spy....And two orphaned Russian brothers embark on radically different paths when their plan to emigrate to America falls afoul of war, conscription, and revolution.

From the dirt and danger of a coal mine to the glittering chandeliers of a palace, from the corridors of power to the bedrooms of the mighty, Fall of Giants takes us into the inextricably entangled fates of five families - and into a century that we thought we knew, but that now will never seem the same again....

One of my favorite books is PILLARS OF THE EARTH by Ken Follett.  I loved his way of combining true historical events with a mesmerizing fictional tale.  He has done the same thing in this book - this time telling of the events leading up to and including World War I and the Bolsevik Revolution in Russia.

It was a little difficult distinguishing the different characters - the German, the Welsh, the English, the Russian.  So many names and places.  Luckily, there is a map of 1914 Europe and a list of characters in the front of the book to which I referred often.  I had a little knowledge of this era, but Mr. Follett brought out so many interesting points in the 985 pages.

This book is the first in a trilogy.  The next book, WINTER OF THE WORLD, covering the Depression and World War II will focus on the children of the main characters of this book.  I'm looking forward to it.