CIRCLE OF DAYS tells the enthralling story of the building of Stonehenge. Fifteen-year-old Seft is a miner, who works down the pit mining flints with this father and two brothers. Unlike his relatives, Seft is a peaceable fellow, who is looking for a family. When he meets Neen at one of the religious rites held every quarter year at The Monument, life glows with hope. For Neen is the elder daughter of Ani, an Elder of the Herder community. Ani’s task is to ensure that disputes are resolved peacefully, so she is totally against any kind of physical violence.
This whole story of child abuse and Seft’s efforts to leave his father (and brothers) takes up the beginning of this tale.
Ten years pass and Neen’s younger brother Han becomes a young man and partners with Pia. Unfortunately, Pia is from the Farmer community, and they are dead set against their women marrying out. So Pia is forced to escape. At first, she and Han are blissfully happy. Until the farmers in the shape of Troon—a man addicted to violence—come after them.
This tragic story of dictatorial rule and the pall it casts over everyone, takes up most of the rest of the book.
Then we have the romance between Joia, Ani’s younger daughter and Dee, a shepherd.
Did I mention that this novel has to do with the building of Stonehenge? Indeed it does! But author Ken Follett has located the superhuman efforts of the humans who dragged the stones to Salisbury plain, set them upright and then (just for fun) put stone lintels on top, in the ugly and messy politics of human society.
It is these pushes and pulls, and all of the emotions that come with them that makes the novel great. I don’t think you will be disappointed by this latest piece by Ken Follett.
