Reviews

Night Over Water by Ken Follett

Only show reviews with written explanations

kathycolvi's review against another edition

3.0

It is an older Follett book. I enjoyed it a lot but it is not a saga like we've become accustomed to from Ken Follett. Still, he brings together a broad cast of characters whose lives are woven together during a flight over the Atlantic on a luxury flight right as WWII begins.

groadie's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous lighthearted tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

4.0

I enjoyed this book, but it has one flaw that I'm going to detail. It's the "trauma/ trauma dump then immediate sex" trope that for some reason authors seem to love. A character is locked in a house by her brother to prevent her from catching the flight. Her would-be lover comes and saves her, and they immediately decide have sex, in the same house mind you. I don't know about anyone else, but if I've just spent the past hour and a half panicking and worrying that I'm going to die of thirst, the last thing in my mind when I get out is how soon I'm going to get it off with some hot british pilot. This happened in another book, "now we shall be entirely free" by Andrew Miller, where a character recounts her heart-wrenching trauma about her family to a guy and then just immediately gets over it when they decide to fuck. To me, this linking of trauma and sex is just really icky, and also, interestingly, seems to be a trope mainly perpetrated by male authors.

Other than this lol this book is a great adventure story and the characters are very well developed!

biodesert's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous medium-paced

2.0

helenewallace's review against another edition

Go to review page

3.0

Enjoyed the first 3/4. Liked the back stories for the various characters and the details of the travel but felt he tried to through too many twists in at the end.

ragul1099's review

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

rellimreads's review against another edition

Go to review page

5.0

This was a buddy read with my dad. Despite having no previous experience with the author or narrator - I really enjoyed this. It’s an interesting series of chapters giving backgrounds of various unrelated characters who will eventually end up on a transatlantic sea plane together. Set during the declaration of WWII, this is sort of soap opera meets mystery/thriller. These individual characters and their stories were really wild and it was a fun listen. Many times I thought I knew where Follett was taking the storyline to end up being completely surprised. More than 14 hours of pure entertainment.

Tom Casaletto’s narration was really well done. There were dozens of characters of various genders, ages, and accents. One character even fakes multiple accents and Casaletto keeps them all consistent.