Bittersweet Endings

Whenever I finish a really good book I'm always left with a bittersweet feeling. I love having spent time in another world with exciting characters, and I always feel a sense of satisfaction on completion. But I also feel sad that I'm done! Never again will I be able to experience the story again for the first time. I no longer get to inhabit the places the characters live or go through their struggles and triumphs.

I just finished Ken Follett's Pillars of the Earth after a week of consuming it in every spare moment I had. This book is nearly a thousand pages long! The story is incredible and spans decades as a cathedral is built in England during The Anarchy when King Henry I has died with no lawful heir besides a daughter and an illegitimate son. The fight for the crown is the secondary story which propels much of what the main characters must go through. There's fighting, pillaging, beheadings, cursings, religious strife, true love, evil bishops, witches, cathedral building.

This book has some really strong women, which I like. Aliena, the displaced Earl's daughter, endures setback after setback, but always finds a way to rise above it. She is resourceful and strong and doesn't take crap from anyone. She knows what she wants and she does everything in her power to achieve it. Unfortunately, this does cause her to make one astoundingly bad choice, but even that she overcomes.

There's a fair amount of violence and sex in the book, so I recommend it with those caveats. There's also a Starz miniseries production of the book. I of course became interested in it because Eddie Redmayne stars in it. The miniseries is good as well, but the book will give you more detail and nuances. The miniseries also has taken some liberties with the book to make it more cinematic and to move the story along a little faster.