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Summary: Sarum, The Novel of England
Review: After a rather difficult start for the reader, the author deveops an exceedingly moving story (history) of the area in which Stonehenge and the Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin Mary are located in Salsbury. As a coincident, I was visiting my daughter and her family in Wimbledon when I was reading this book. We visited the Salisbury plain, Stonehenge, and Cathedral and that visit multiplied my enjoyment of the book exponentially.
The author traces four families from prehistoric times to the present in a saga like manner. Truly an historic book, novel that it is. I highly recommend this to all Anglophiles.
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Summary: 10,000 years held in the palms of your hand
Review: (...)Edward Rutherfurd is a pleasure to read. I only commend this book for four stars, however, because the history of the times sometimes took backseat to the pettiness of the Wilsons vs. Shockley sub-text.
Bravo Edward. But now that you've warmed up, when are you going to tackle the Americas?
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Summary: The Saga of Stonehenge
Review: For a historical monument of which so little is known Mr. Rutherford sure makes you feel like you're actually living it.
The depth of the story is mind boggling yet it doesn't bog down like other epics. Every character actually has credibility and depth. The monuments method of construction is highly credible.
Brilliance of this type needs recognition.
Little else needs to be said.
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Summary: Sarum Ate It Hard
Review: This book, claiming to be a thorough historical novel, is nothing more than a shallow, boring tale of people who live and die that I couldn't care less about. It was probably written to make the lives of AP European History students hell. First of all, it is too lengthy. The characters never get the chance to develop, and the new characters that are introduced die off in the next 40 or 50 pages anyway. I began to care less and less about each family. Also, for a reason which I have no idea, this novel is FILLED with sex and promiscuity. Why does the author feel the need to include the scene when chief Krona receives Oral Sex? Why does he take the time to include the homosexual encounter between the abbot and the younger disciple, only to have them killed off in the next five pages by Vikings? This book is filled with unnecessary sexual encounters. It was a waste of eight dollars as well a waste of my summer. I would have had more fun researching english history on my own. If you intend to buy this book, you must be an English history buff anyway, so don't waste your time and money with this one. However, if you are interested in fire, the book is quite thick (over 1000 pages)and it would probably burn for a good ten minutes.
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Summary: Use it to torture P.O.W.s
Review: this book was written to torture Honors British Literature students. It's lengthy with pointless historical tidbits... if you're reading this book, you've got to be obsessed with british history already, so why bother with length historical information? And you'd think the book would be able to stay afloat with it's character insights, but they just come out cliched. The gay priest, the nymphomaniac native, the athiest turned monk, the stupid slut, the tortured artisan, come on! We've seen this stuff before, and written ten times better to boot. The dreary 1000 pages used in the printing of this novel could have been used for a better cause...toilet paper for third world countries is a great example...but since it's already too late, I've discovered my copy of Sarum is extremely flammable and doubles as an excellent torture device.
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Summary: 1000 pages of the shallowest people you never want to meet.
Review: Sarum : The Novel of England by Edward Rutherfurd is a historical-fictional account of the life and times of Salisbury England and the people who lived there. He begins his tale with pre-historic man and continues to modern day. Each chapter is a small snippet of history with characters from that time. Essentially he follows 4 to 5 families through history and we see how they develop. How each family grows and changes depends upon the circumstances of time. An example of this is Osmund Mason a talented artisan who after time becomes a master mason. Unbeknownst to him his ancestor was responsible for the construction of Stonehenge. His family are craftsmen and they evolve and adapt over time to the new methods of masonry and sculpture. I found the scope of this book remarkable and the idea exciting. This is the primary reason why I purchased this book. Also, what is fascinating with this tale is the landscape and the setting. It amazes me that bloodthirsty Viking marauders once stalked the same ground that a church occupies today. Also, what I found especially interesting where the chapters devoted to the builders. The book came alive when Rutherfurd wrote about the construction of both the druid temple of Stonehenge and the Roman Catholic Cathedral. These chapters were fascinating. The reader can visualize the work involved building both of these edifices. You can feel the character's efforts required accomplishing something so magnificent. For these chapters alone I might have recommended Sarum. However, I cannot fully endorse Sarum, the characters are not fully developed and they are never given a chance to grow. It seems that when a story finally becomes interesting Rutherfurd decides to wrap it up and have them die of old age (or something else). This may be a peculiarity of mine but I need characters that I care about and Sarum never let me have any. At one point it got so bad that I no longer cared who was from what family (even though the genealogical table/chart was helpful). The other reviewers are correct when they compare Rutherfurd to Michener. Both write this kind of novel, long stories of epic scale. They both attempt to develop their characters over centuries of life. Yet both have the same problem of creating stories that are too large and populating their stories with shallow characters.
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Summary: One of the best books Ive ever read!!!
Review: This is undoubtedly one of the best books I have ever read.Rutherford covers the history of the Sarum/Salisbury area of England from the Ice Age to the Present Day through the eyes of five families. He moves from generation to generation with effortless skill , capturing the mood and colour of each period brilliantly. As fortunes change and new challenges are dealt with ,we share the lives of many remarkable men and women .All of this is woven into a rich tapestry which is a must for anyone who likes historical novels
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Summary: Get this man an editor!
Review: Long and dreary, wordy and blurry. Not uninteresting in parts, but in order to capture an "epic" scope, Rutherford relies on widely disjointed episodes, fragmented and compromised by bad fiction and worse history. Run on sentences and poor syntax are hallmarks of this books style. I finished it just because I don't like to quit. On the other hand, my wife reads all of his books. Despite this, we have a sound marriage. Even she thinks his prose is long winded and bloated, but she is a first class Anglophile, and so feels she must defend this exercise in tedium. I think it is much too long, and I like Finnegans Wake! Don't read the next sentences if you're going to read this book anyway. There is one continuing thread throughout the book. It peters out about 4/5ths of the way through. It just disappears. You follow the freakin' thing through hundreds of pages and there is no denouement. Just disappears from ken. For this alone, I hate this book.
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Summary: Sarum
Review: A masterfully written, engrossing novel. Perfect for those who revel in historical fiction. If you like James Michener, you will love Sarum.
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Summary: The Novel of England is the Novel of Humanity
Review: Reading Sarum has been one of my life's most enjoyable experiences. It's not too often that I read something and feel so emotional inside. It makes you feel as if you're actually there, and the characters are expressed so magnificently that you really feel like you are a part of them. This novel is rich in history as well as fiction. When I finished, I was so eager to read more that I paced back and forth, frustrated that it was "only" over 1,000 pages. This novel makes you wish it was longer. The opening pages contain a family tree representing all the families and their descendents. When you finish and look over that tree again, you have this incredible connection with each character and that character's distinct characteristics. This novel is a MUST READ. It will make you feel connected to history, to England, to literature, to romance, to scandal, to despair, to war, to religion, to politics, to chivalry, to personality...so many personalities, and ancestry. And love. And life. When I walk into a bookstore, the first thing I do is walk over to the fiction section and read a favorite excerpt from this book. Just writing this review brings tears to my eyes.
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