Love this book like all the others in the Kingsbridge series, despite it being outside the main historical period I'm interested in, the middle ages. There isn't much connection to characters from the previous books in the series, no descendants or anything. The location of Kingsbridge, the cathedral, the monument the prior Philip and a couple of other buildings are the only references or connections. It was definitely a page turner and I couldn't put it down. I read in 4 days, while on holiday mind you. The couple of chapters about the battle of Waterloo were the least interesting to me. I'm not that into battles (funny as next I'm reading a trilogy about the start of the hundred years war). Interesting to realize the location of Waterloo was nothing of significance, barely a dot on the map, before the battle. I enjoyed the placing of the story at the start of the industrial revolution, using the textile industry to show the shift from the different stages of the process being done solely by hand in individuals home to machines in factories operated by less individual but producing more. And the workers fight to save their jobs, but "progress" always winning in the end. It reminds me a lot about the self checkout debates going on right now. Some people don't want to introduce new technologies if people are going to loss jobs. ( )

I don't know, it was for sure better than The Evening and The Morning. as in far that Follett didn't try to fill pages with senseless smut and violence when he had no idea how to bring the story forward.
On the other hand, it was again same old same old. The upstarter from the peasant class who makes his way despite all the hurdles that are thrown in his way, the middle class characters that were always in love with each other but they didn't find to each other until their golden years of live, and yes, the villain from the noble class, even though here he was only really part of the story in the first half, and not very good developed at that as well.
Which brings us to one of the major flaws, the whole story felt not very well developed, not round and smooth, it felt "too clean" not gritty and dirty, more like a cheap tv movie set with no speck of dust, and with surprisingly mediocre writing.
I had hoped that Waterloo would be the saving grace for this otherwise boring story but alas it wasn't so. On the contrary, I was surprised by how lacklustre Follett wrote about the battles on the continent, be it Spain or Netherlands.
Sure it is one of the most famous battles in European history, but I was surprised that none of the characters played an important role in it and were only bystanders or observers. I mean, I don't recall that Follett had problems before in adding a little bit of made up story to his historic events, so why start now? (Just think about how bad ass heroic Kit and Roger could have been if they would have thrown together a last minute engineering masterpiece to help out the 107 foot?)
Let's see if there will be a last instalment that brings Kingsbridge into the present time ... following his pattern it should be another smut fest again ;-) ( )

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If someone gave him a prize for every million copies his books sold, Ken Follett would have 17 of them.
His métier is the long historical saga. The Armor of Light, the fourth novel set in the fictional cathedral town of Kingsbridge, runs more than 700 pages. Each of the Kingsbridge novels is set in a different historical period. The Armor of Light covers the Kingsbridge families of clerics, mill owners, and mill hands from the mid-1790s to the mid-1820s. It gives a much more working-class picture of English society than Jane Austen ever imagined. We follow the clothing industry from hand-spun and hand-woven cloth to batteries of steam-driven looms and the beginnings of card-programmed machines. We hear of the Luddite movement, military impressment, and anti-union laws.
The plot follows four or five central characters with interlocked relationships. The shifting point of view keeps the plot moving, and we are not surprised when several of them find themselves with Wellington at Waterloo. There are middle-class children born out of wedlock, women doing men’s work, and successful same-sex relationships that are more credible than expected.
It is a good long beach read. I found it fun to compare it to other chroniclers of the period, Elizabeth Gaskell, Jane Austen, and William Makepeace Thackeray. And I suppose Dickens’s Hard Times deserves a shoutout. Only Dickens could have rivaled Follett for sales. ( )

Ken Follett does it again with this book! It’s great to return to Kingsbridge in this book set in the late 18th and early 19th Century. As always with Ken Follett he creates great characters, both good and bad, and he does an excellent job of making you have to read on to find out what is going to happen next.

As you can imagine from the time this was set, amongst the Industrial Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, this isn’t all hearts and roses. The authorities are clamping down on the ‘workers’ as they are running scared following the French Revolution and fear the same will happen in England. There are some tragic stories and cases within this book which leave you crestfallen and both upset and angry. Ken Follett really does an excellent job bringing this period to life, and showing the impact on everyday lives.

Towards the end of the book it also covers the Battle of Waterloo, and Napoleon’s last stand. This is well-written, but feels a bit out of place compared to the rest of the book. It is however important for the book in what happens to our characters following the battle.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough, and despite being over 1000 pages, it passes all too quickly. If anything it makes me want to go back and restart the whole if this series. I do hope he will continue this series.

Put quite simply, five stars and a favourite! ( )