Labyrinth (CD)
£2.24
A good story and some flawed writing - This novel contains two stories. One is set in Southern France in the Middle Ages, and evolves around Alaïs, a young woman whose father is a member of a secret society and who is a guardian of one of three books related to the grail. As the threat of war with the north becomes larger, he confides in her, and asks her to deliver a message to his leader in case something happens to him in his duties.The other story takes place in modern day France. Alice Tanner, a volunteer at an archaeological excavation stumbles upon a mysterious cave with strange engravings, a sign of a labyrinth, some ancient artefacts and two skeletons. Her find triggers a chain of events that bring more trouble than Alice bargained for.I must admit that I enjoyed reading this book and I really liked the story. Especially the one set in mediaeval times. The author gave such clear descriptions of life in Carcassonne that I could certainly picture it in my mind.However, despite some well described scenes I am not all that thrilled with the writing in general. First of all, I was put out by the author s extensive use of suspense techniques. The book is ridden with cliff hangers, chance meetings, unlikely coincidences, betrayal, conspiracies and bodies floating in a river. It s just too much.Secondly, some of the similes and metaphors are awful. I regret not having marked the page but I distinctly remember reading about the hot and humid air that was as oppressive as a giant squatting Buddha. Seriously!Having that said, I did like reading the book, and was willing to overlook the sometimes flawed writing for the sake of the story. And to come to the author s defence, I don t think her writing should be compared with Dan Brown s, whose prose is so ghastly that I ve come to see it as an accomplishment on its own.
Great book to escape into! - Ok.....confession! I listened to this book on an audio recording on my ipod going to and from work. Whether that made it a little easier to get into I m not sure, probably. When I did start listening I could not turn the damn thing off! I ended up taking my ipod out of my car and listening to the story while indoors too.It s very suited to my taste of reading, lots of history and it paints a very vivid picture of the life and times back in the early 1200 s. Even the modern day scenes were so easy to imagine after Kate had descried them in such detail. So much so i d love to visit Carcassonne!If you re looking for thrills, twists and turns this may not be the book for you. The plot was quite obvious to me, but the way I perceived - I don t think Kate was ever trying to keep you guessing, or hiding things - she was just telling the story in her own way.I loved the two heroines and thought they were realistic of the times. The only thing I d say as a negative is I would have liked Kate to expand on the links between the two. However, I thought the epilogue was fab - and am definitely going to buy another of Kate s brilliant books.
I say burn the heretics - Someone once said that burning books is next thing to burning people. Well this could give the practice of book-burning a good name. Written with the Da Vinci code in one hand and a travel guide to the Languedoc in the other, the plot and characters are as cliched as they are poorly motivated. 720 pages of adventure story cliche finishing in a mess where parallel timelines come together in a literary car crash of an ending that left me speechless. It doesn t work as a historical novel either, we learn hardly anything about what the Cathars believed in or why the grail was so important to the protagonists or why these god-botherers should wish to preserve a life-giving elixir from Ancient Egypt! As for the plaudits this tosh received from serious journals - I can only imagine that Kate has swapped canape recipes with some major book reviewers.
AWFUL! - It is such a relief to see so many people agreeing with my (long held) opinion of this book. Just seen Ms Mosse on a TV show and I logged on to add my thoughts on this book which I read 2 yrs ago. It has haunted me, the shoddy writing, lazy, idiotic plot and flimsy 2 dimensional characters, but mostly it has haunted me because it ended up a best seller. I am no writer, I would never claim to have such talents, but i was baffled peoples admiration for this s book. Keep posting your thoughts. Its great to see the intelligent and astute critiquing!
Slow start, but got better - It took a while for me to get into the book, but I persevered and ended up liking it. The connection between the two women, one from the 13th century and the other from the 21st century, becomes apparent quite early on. I enjoyed the story and watching it unfold, although it s not the best book I have read. It is interesting but not intriguing.