World Without End, by Ken Follett

Another great rollercoaster ride of a story. If you are a fan of history, particularly of the middle ages, you could do worse. Not high brow literature, but so well paced and replete with interesting details of life in the 14th century that you can suspend your need for artfully crafted prose. It really has everything life has to offer and packed into 1000 pages. You don't need to read Pillars of the Earth to appreciate this story, but it helps a bit with some of the references. This story takes place a couple hundred years after Pillars, in the same town in England. Descendants of Pillars' protagonists are alive and well and there are a whole new set of political intrigues, power struggles, cathedral building, love and religious conflict (with secularism) all set against a backdrop of the plague. As a reader, I kept waiting for some particularly wicked character to get killed off in a skirmish or accident or at the hands of a jilted lover and when he/she didn't, I figured that the plague would get them - not always the case. Many a plot turn and it all ties nicely together at the end. This is a great book to read before nodding off to sleep - 5-10 pages a night take about 10 minutes and you can get through the book in 3-4 months. To people who say they don't have time to read, this is the perfect book. It is effortless (light), if not a bit gory at times, and will make you feel good at the end. Enjoy! Oh, I highly recommend reading Pillars of the Earth - at least as good, probably better.