I struggled with whether or not to give this one more stars. The author does write well, and it is an intriguing story with some fairly intense moments. So why only 3 stars? Because I almost gave it only 2. I‘d love to explain why, but there‘s only 471 characters available so you‘ll have to read my review on Goodreads.

Ahh-mazing!! The best part is the dialogue. The main characters are snarky and opinionated, full of pride and arrogance, spiteful and vain. I resonated most with Mr. Bennet. Without giving away too much of the story, as the whirlwind of young, female emotions is in full force around him, his attitude throughout is to retire to his library with a book. My least favorite would be his wife, who seems to change her opinions of others constantly.

OMG I've never laughed so much at someone else's misfortune than I did while reading this novel. The situations the author found himself in as a child aren't funny, they are desperate and more than challenging; yet the way he details the events of his life are filled with the humor only one who lived through it can have. It is simply amazing that Mr McCourt lived long enough to write this memoir. Highly recommend this book!

Started the writing process for Book #3 earlier this month. Books #1 & #2 are available on my website (http://michaelchrobakauthor.com) or through Amazon in paperback and Kindle versions

When I first got my hands on The Pillars of the Earth, my first thought was, “Woah…this is a heavy book.” It is a huge tome. Nine-hundred and seventy-three pages huge. Over four-hundred thousand words. This book is like reading an entire series of books for most authors. It was daunting, to say the least. Being that I‘m not the fastest reader, I gave myself a month to finish it. I did it in ten days. So, yeah, I guess I liked it.

As a huge fan of the Jack Ryan books, I was somewhat disappointed by this novel. Although it had the same Clancy flair, it lacked the intrigue and thrill of the Ryan series. It was also fairly repetitive, as the majority is descriptions of how various units (ground, air and naval) would have operated at that time. At times I felt as if It was a retelling of some video game junkies last few hours of game play. Bottom line, I was not impressed.

The story was very well written and kept my interest from the first page to the last. It is full of intrigue, but did come off a bit unrealistic and predictable at times. I was also not happy with the scenes of violent sexual encounters and had to skip several parts. I honestly believe the author did not need to go into the level of detail they had for those.

First of all, I didn't finish the book. I simply couldn't. It started off on a positive note, like a lot of first dates I've been on. Unfortunately it ended with a fake phone call, sudden emergency, gotta run - it's not you it's me kind of ending. I'm actually surprised I made it to page 70.

You can read my full review on Goodreads