Eighteen years after Ken Follett published the awe-inspiring historical epic, The Pillars of the Earth, his fans eagerly pounced upon the long-waited sequel, World Without End.

Like its predecessor, World Without End is a mammoth tale set in medieval England, in the city of Kingsbridge, two centuries after the completion of the great Kingsbridge cathedral.

Kingsbridge in the 14th century is a bustling, important city of 7000 people, which draws worshippers and traders from all over Europe.

On the day after All Hallows' Day (Halloween), in the year 1327, four children slip away from Kingsbridge. They are a thief (Gwenda), a bully (Ralph), a boy genius (Merthin) and a girl who wants to be a doctor (Caris). In the forbidden forest, they meet a knight and see two men murdered. They also witness the burial of a clandestine letter so dangerous that the knight becomes a monk to seek refuge in the Priory.

As adults, the four children's lives will be entwined by ambition, love, greed and revenge. They will see prosperity and famine, the devastating effects of the Black Death plague and the ravages of war.

Merthin will travel the world but come home in the end. Directly descended from Jack Builder, Tom Builder's stepson and original architect of Kingsbridge cathedral, he becomes a brilliant engineer and architect who defies convention and traditions but still manages to achieve spectacular success.

Ralph, Merthin's brother, will become a powerful, corrupt nobleman. Eerily echoing the actions of the ruthless William Hamleigh in The Pillars of the Earth, he uses his warlike skills to oppress his serfs and to reach the top of medieval society.

Caris will become a nun and defy the might of the medieval church. She has always distrusted the monks' practice of bleeding and encouraging pus to form on wounds. As a girl, she watched helplessly how her own ailing mother became worse after a bleeding procedure and died soon after. She vowed to become a physician but girls cannot become physicians in the medieval world. Monks who were educated at Oxford and who had studied the ancient Greek texts are the only ones trusted to handle the many illnesses that strike the city's residents. They regard the nuns as mere helpers who have to follow their commands in the hospital.

Caris' ambitions push the boundaries of stiff rules set in the conservative medieval church. Always putting others' well-being ahead of herself, her ambitions rob her of personal happiness and blight her relationship with the man she loves.

Gwenda will pursue an impossible love. Plain and achingly poor, Gwenda is often forced to steal for her family. She is in love with Wulfric, the most handsome and prosperous man in her village. Although Wulfric is engaged to coquettish Annette, whom he loves, Gwenda is determined to do whatever it takes to be his wife.

Throughout the book, these four central characters will live under the long shadow of the unexplained killing they witnessed on that fateful childhood day, and wonder about the significance of the secret letter.

Exciting and mesmerizing, World Without End is a satisfying sequel to The Pillars of the Earth. Follett even manages to make his characters more detailed and multifaceted in the sequel, with complex themes such as nascent feminism and the birth of modern medicine.

Note: World Without End was first published in 2007 by Macmillan. This review was based on the 2008 edition published by Pan Books, an imprint of Pan Macmillan, Ltd. The Pan edition contains 1237 pages. - Aimee Dawis

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