But will Ned keep his head and Margery hers? Or, as Margery wonders lamentingly, “Had Ned caught Rollo, or not? Would the ceremony go ahead? Would Ned be there? Would they all die?” Ah, it is but to wonder.

Rollo, Margery’s brother, turns out to offer good cause for suspicion having twitted and tormented Ned over the course of the story, he’s sailing with the Spanish by the end. Her mom and dad are well-connected and powerful-but, alas, Catholic, not the best choice of beliefs in an age when Tudor Protestantism is taking a vengeful turn and heads are rolling. Ned Willard, returning from the Continent on a boatload of “cloth from Antwerp and wine from Bordeaux,” beats a hasty path through the snow and gloom to the lissome lass he’s sweet on, Margery Fitzgerald. Here he delivers with a vengeance, with his Kingsbridge story, set in the shadow of a great provincial cathedral, now brought into the age of Elizabeth. It’s not that Follett’s been slacking between books: he’s been working away at the Century Trilogy, set centuries later, and otherwise building on the legacy of high-minded potboilers he began with Eye of the Needle (1978). Ken Follett’s A Column of Fire novel is available on Amazon.A flying buttress of a book, continuing the hefty Kingsbridge saga historical novelist Follett began with Pillars of the Earth (1989) and World Without End (2007). If you’ve not heard of Epix before, they’re the co-producers of Julian Fellowes’ new period drama series Belgravia, which begins in the US next month. It was followed by a TV adaptation of World Without End in 2012, starring Cynthia Nixon ( Sex and the City), Miranda Richardson ( The Hours), Charlotte Riley ( Wuthering Heights), and Tom Weston-Jones ( Copper).Ī Column of Fire is expected to premiere on Epix in the US in 2021. The Pillars of the Earth was adapted for TV by Starz in 2010, starring Ian McShane ( Lovejoy), Hayley Atwell ( Howards End), Rufus Sewell ( Victoria), Matthew Macfadyen ( Ripper Street), and Eddie Redmayne ( The Danish Girl). Mickery was previously an actress, appearing as Maggie Thorpe in the BBC’s Tenko.Ī Column of Fire follows the 1558 romance between Ned Willard and Margery Fitzgerald, continuing on through half a century of political intrigue and turmoil. The upcoming Elizabethan-era television series will be written by Lizzie Mickery.

The 2017 novel is the third book in Follett’s successful Kingsbridge series.Ī Column of Fire follows 1989’s The Pillars of the Earth and 2007’s World Without End. A new TV adaptation of A Column of Fire by Ken Follett has been announced.

A column of fire