Riveting Historical Fiction: “A Column Of Fire” By Ken Follett

As soon as I finished Ken Follett’s The Evening And The Morning, I dove headfirst into the final novel in his Kingsbridge series: A Column Of Fire. I’m glad I did—it might be the best one yet.

A Column Of Fire stands out as markedly different from the rest of the Kingsbridge series. While The Pillars Of The Earth, World Without End, and The Evening And The Morning had similar settings, characters, and structure—all of which worked brilliantly in those novels—A Column Of Fire takes place during the Renaissance, offering a refreshing break from the Middle Ages. It also features a decidedly different cast of characters and a sweepingly epic scope.

The book’s focus is the conflict between the Catholics and Protestants raging throughout Europe in the late 16th century. This was a time when being a member of the wrong religion could get one burned at the stake. The Spanish Inquisition was eagerly hunting heretics, and England was ruled by Mary I, known as “Bloody Mary” because of her persecution of English Protestants. Every character in the novel stands on one side of this conflict or the other, which drives nearly every significant event in the story.

The book’s main character, Ned Willard, is the first of Follet’s lead Kingsbridge protagonists who is not a builder. Instead, Ned serves in Her Majesty’s secret service, working as Elizabeth I’s chief spymaster. This brings a feeling of international intrigue to the novel, which takes place as much in Paris and London as it does in Kingsbridge. There are also scenes set in Spain and the Netherlands, and even the New World, making A Column Of Fire unique among the Kingsbridge series.

The rest of the novel’s characters are also wonderfully crafted. There is Margery, a devout Catholic who happens to be Protestant Ned’s first love, and Silvia, a brave Protestant who smuggles French bibles to the people of Paris. A bevy of horrible nobles also populates the story on both sides of the pond. And Follet gives us two love-to-hate villains in Rollo, Ned’s lifelong rival at Kingsbridge, and Pierre Aumande, a handsome rogue working for the powerful Guise family in France. Both men become hellbent on eliminating the Protestant heresy and overthrowing Queen Elizabeth to put a Catholic on England’s throne.

Actual historical figures also play a much larger role in A Column Of Fire than in any previous Kingsbridge novel. Queen Elizabeth features prominently, and Mary Queen of Scot’s story is told intermittently throughout the book. Catherine de’ Medici and several kings of France also play key roles, as do James I and Sir Francis Drake.

Given its cast of historical characters, the story naturally progresses through a series of famous events. The St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre in Paris provides some of the book’s most harrowing scenes, while the chapters concerning the battle between the Spanish and English armadas are among the novel’s most exciting. Because the novel covers the entirety of Queen Elizabeth’s reign and part of James I’s, it even includes the Gun Powder Plot of 1605. The result is an epic, rich, and riveting novel about a tremendously significant period of European history.

It’s hard to decide which of the Kingsbridge novels is my favorite, mainly because it’s been so long since I’ve read The Pillars Of The Earth. But A Column Of Fire is at least as good as any book in the series. Overall, I found it to be a brilliant read and one I highly recommend to fans of historical fiction.