Cathedral

Reviews / Votes

"Comparisons are inevitable to Ken Follett's book about the building of a cathedral... Hopkins' debut is the superior: beautifully written and profoundly insightful about its very human characters and their yearning for both God and Mammon." -- Antonia Senior * The Times * "A memorable tapestry of politics, religion and conflicting human desires." "A thoroughly engrossing, beautifully told look at human frailty." * Kirkus Reviews (starred) * "A novel of big ideas seen through the alluring prism of small lives." -- Sarah Bowers * Historical Novels Review * "Six hundred pages sounds long, but this deeply human take on a medieval city and its commerce and aspirations, its violent battle and small intimacies, never feels that way. This sweeping work is as impressive as the cathedral at its centre." * Publishers' Weekly (starred review) * "Rich, moving, and unforgettable, the historical novel Cathedral exposes the vanity inherent in trying to make a mark on history and exalts the power of love, creativity, and truth to leave a meaningful trace on this ephemeral world." * ForeWord Reviews * "A rollercoaster of medieval life with intrigue, corruption, and power struggles on the one hand, beautifully balanced by integrity, artistic vision and the small joys of ordinary life. A treat for lockdown days." -- Catherine Dunne "Another historical novel that took my eye was Cathedral by Ben Hopkins. This adventure, full of intrigue, is set around a religious monument built in the German town of Hagenburg in the 13th century." -- Martin Chilton "Simply and thrillingly, no more or less than a sprawling gothic epic." "One of the novel's broader purposes, is to dispense with romantic cliche and offer a realistic take on medieval society. "No chivalry, but marks, shillings and pence" says one character - to which Hopkins adds stone, glass, cloth, blood, excrement, and other basic materials." "Set over more than 100 years, from 1229 to 1351, this is the epic tale of the construction of an enormous cathedral in the fictional German town of Hagenburg. Great stuff." * Best Books of the Year So Far * "With intersecting plots about the construction of an enormous church in medieval Alsace, Hopkins has constructed a clever commentary on the ironies of history. He shows how a trading empire can have his roots in something as simple as the theft of a wig, and how forbidden love can lead to a lonely death or to the birth of a new community." "Hopkins weaves together a multitude of voices to examine the relationship between medieval worship and the era's politics and economics. The resulting epic is both sweeping and human." "An ambitious, epic debut." * The Sunday Times * "A nimble mesh of intersecting plots that rest on the slow but not so steady, generations-long construction of an enormous church in medieval Alsace." * The New York Times * "Cathedral was seven years in the writing and perhaps even longer in gestation but the fruits of Hopkins labour justify all the effort. This is an epic teeming with humanity... A panorama of medieval life that resonates and offers more than a few home truths about human nature. From philosophy to the battlefield, it's all here." "Cathedral is a compelling story, or really a series of interwoven stories, which is a pleasure to read and follow. It's a fast moving, rumbustious book which takes a bit of reading but which I would heartily recommend." "Be prepared to finish the book possibly without pause simply because it is engrossing and the author has the gift to make both his persona and the era they lived in become real for his readers." (5 stars) "Any fat historical novel that deals with the building of a cathedral is bound to invite comparison with Ken Follett's The Pillars Of The Earth. I am pleased to be able to tell you that this one is very much better...an intelligent and rattlingly good read." * Church Times * "Covering 50 years in the history of a small town in the middle of 13th century German Rhineland this is an epic novel in every way.... for a book that is over 600 pages long, I was held gripped till the end. Highly recommended." "Cathedral is an engrossing and compelling novel...I felt heartily involved with the characters. I did find it a dark and troubling read (this is not an 'easy' period of history) but it is a memorable one. It's difficult to imagine a more convincing portrayal of life and death in 13th-century Europe." "One of the best historical novels I've read in a long time. Cathedral is a triumph." -- Dan Jones (historian, TV presenter, author of Powers and Thrones)