The Man from St. Petersburg

Loved it and evert book by Follett. His historical novels bring history alive. He develops the characters well. Ready for another one of h I s

In many ways, this is vintage Ken Follett. It is fast-paced and keeps you wanting to see what is going to happen next. The writing is good and he does a good job of developing his characters and plot. He also seems to have a good feel for English society in the period immediately before WWI. Despite all this, however, I found myself less than satisfied with the overall result. He gives you Feliks, a Russian anachist and murderer who is on a misguided mission to stop an attempt to negotiate an alliance between Britain and Russia because he is convinced that millions of Russian peasants will die. It never seems to occur to him that the coming war will involve Russia anyway and that millions of peasants will die with or without an alliance. Then Follett tries to make Feliks a sympathetic character. He has been badly wronged in his life. Well, for me, it didn't work. Feliks was still a misguided terrorist bent on murder. Then you get the usual improbabilities: women whose misguided sympathies cause them to let Feliks get closer to his target than he ever would; Feliks miraculously escaping capture despite all odds; and Feliks resorting to a completely improbable tactic at the end. The climax finds Feliks resorting to a tactic that can best be described as using an elephant gun to kill a flea. He needs to flush out the Prince in order to get a shot at him, but Follett would have us accept that Feliks would endanger all that he seems to hold dear in the process. Churchill's action at the end to retrieve the situation was clever plotting, but seemed obvious to me as soon as it was clear what Feliks was going to do. I'm rather thought it would have occurred to Feliks, too. It would have been another good reason to not do what he did. In many ways, "The Man From St. Petersburg" is a good read. For me, though, it asked me to go farther in suspending disbelief than I was prepared to go. The clever ending was a little too clever, and left me somewhat less than satisfied.

This book enjoys continuing popularity twenty eight years after it first hit the bestseller list, and with good reason. It is a masterfully crafted thriller. In fact Albert Zuckerman (Writing the Blockbuster Novel) uses The Man from St. Petersburg as a pedagogical tool for outlining a novel. Zuckerman shows how Follett's outlines of the plot evolved over four outlines. The complexities of plot and the revelation of character did not flow through Follett's fingertips as he was typing. The result is one of the very best novels written, of any genre, and one of the few which deserve its commercial success. Feliks, a Russian anarchist, is intent on killing the Russian Prince sent by the Tsar to negotiate an alliance with England, to prevent Germany from taking over all of Western Europe. His motivation is to save the lives of Russian peasants who would be killed in a cause not their own. His unwitting ally is the daughter of an English lord, who is at an age when rebellion against her parents is natural. The action builds to a fiery crescendo as the lord's manor house burns, and young Winston Churchill gets the prince's signature on the treaty minutes before the anarchist fires a shotgun point blank into his chest. In the process Follett gives us a rather serious lesson in history. You will understand where all the pieces were on the chessboard that was Europe in 1914. Read it for the excitement; read it as history; or read it for its classic structure, but you must read it.

This story has a lot of good parts, but not a whole lot. It started out to be interesting, then a huge lull about the Walden family and their cast system. It was amazing how this one man had avoided all kinds of attempts to catch him. And, where were all those police & Army personnel to protect everyone? It go ridiculous that Charolete could sneak past them and sneak past them again to get her “father” into the house. Also, with all the love Charolete and her Mother had for Russia, there was no mention of the slaughter of the Czar and his family. You would think that would have turned her against the socialist. This is the Ugly.

It is an amazing piece of history and a great storytelling. I kept turning the pages to see what next.

Follett knows how to spin a tale and to make characters come alive. History becomes personalized. What a twist of fate to bring a young impetuous girl into the orbit of her long lost father, her mother’s past, and international intrigue on the cusp of a war. I couldn’t stop burning through the pages.

Follett's second international best-seller was a resounding success but not the juggernaut blockbuster that Eye of the Needle had been four years previously. Nonetheless, it was good enough. This tale is set at the dawn of World War One, when the novel's antagonist/protagonist a Russian anarchist named Feliks Kschessinsky is determined to assassinate one Prince Aleksey Orlov, a Russian admiral who is for the purposes of the storyline a nephew of the real-life Tsar Nicolas II and the fictional Earl of Walden. The Earl's Russian wife the Countess Lydia had once had a premarital affair with Feliks, who was sent to Siberia for the the rest of his natural life while she was forced to make a pre-arranged match with the English nobleman. Feliks escaped from prison many years later, joins an anti-Monarchist anarchist group and makes his way to London when he learns that the young Admiral has brokered a deal to forge an alliance between Russia and Britain should Germany go to war. He also strikes up a friendship with Lydia's susceptible, innocent, but rebellious daughter Lady Charlotte, which is when the plot really gets going. This is a fast-paced story that will satisfy any bookworm although it lacks the spine-tingling suspense that heightened the drama in Eye of the Needle, still considered by many to be Follett's finest.

Engaging storyline with good historical background. Sometimes too much description of unimportant details. I wish the author had added more background / story of England and Russia. There was so much of historical interest happening at this time. This could have been a great book instead it was just a good short story.

Come sempre Ken Follet si dimostra maestro nel gestire il racconto di eventi storici intrecciandoli con situazioni e storie di fantasia che rendono il romanzo avvincente e interessante. L'inglese e scorrevole e facile da capire

Absorbing.

Follett verbindet auch hier mal wieder historische Entwicklungen spannend, intelligent und glaubhaft mit Fiktion, so lernt man gerne Geschichte! Der Clou am Ende ist Churchhills schnelle Entscheidung, die den Eintritts Russlands in den Krieg sicherstellt.

Follett blends history with fiction to build the characters, their interactions, and develop an intriguing tension that leads to an exciting and surprising end. One of his best IMHO! Must read for all Follett fans.

Great read, couldn't put it down, great plot and many twists and turns