BOOK REVIEW: Jackdaws by Ken Follett
My Recommendation:
- Do you have the feminist nerve in you?
- Does your inner instinct voice the strength of women?
- Do you believe that Women can strike back dirt?
If you've answered yes, to any of these, this novel is a must read for you. The past few novels that I have read have been genuine recommendations and reading them has quenched the thirst of an enjoyable, gripping, sensible story reading.
This is an enjoyable book with colorful characters and a lot of intimate moments defined with subtle details. The two explicitly defined characters are:
Flick Clairet - A strong woman, determined to battle for her land, yet emotional and soft who loves her husband madly only to see her trust breaking away at the whims of his pervert attitude. She falls in love with another man, yet had a lot of respect for him to be able to leave him. A small twist to the story and this would have been even more grappling. Follett could have carved Flick as an even stronger woman who had the guts to leave her husband and NOT fall into any other love affair, only fight for her land, for her cause of lead the French Resistance, win against the Nazis and be an epitome of strength and courage. The twists and turns with Flick involving herself in an extra marital affair made her lose the dignity that I carved for the protagonist of the story.
Dieter - The Nazi interrogator. He is a ruthless torturer although we also see his cultured side and his love for a Jewish mistress. He even gets terrible migraines when he has to torture people so Follett manages to create a villain who is still believable and not a caricature of the evil Nazi.
Book Review:
"Try and Try until you succeed".
"Arise, Awake and stop not till the goal is achieved."
This novel exemplifies these statements. It contains enough background information to understand the historical connection to the story. Set on a well developed plot, this fictional work by Ken Follett, serves as an interesting insight into the French Resistance during the World war II. Flick Clairet, the female protagonist of the story is a level headed, strong and determined Woman who is bent on capturing and disrupting a crucial telephone exchange. She fails miserably due to lack of information and careful planning, landing into a whole bunch of resistance members being captured, tortured and spitting fine details of the underground team. Dieter, the Nazi interrogator unravels a lot of critical information of Flick's plans.
But does that deter Flick? Doesn't she strike back? Where does she build her team from? Her strategy, planning, love affairs, weakness and strengths are precisely captured by Follett.
Flick regroups in England, with an all female team, who are all from different walks of life, including a convicted murderer, a Cockney explosives expert thief, a lesbian aristocrat and a transvestite whose lover had been killed by the Germans. The journey the women take, the danger they get into is the crux of the story. They are all in-disciplined, unprofessionals who give Flick a tough time in organizing the army and planning the sabotage.
The novel is carefully paced over a week. There are a number of rendezvous and escapes for the women brigade that is consistently entertaining. Delving back into history, we know that the Allies would win the battle, but you wouldn't know who will survive and who gets captured until the end. What makes the story interesting is both Flick's efforts and the Wehrmacht officer who is attempting to thwart her plans and capture her. Both of them struggle with various issues, and the faceoff continues up until the very end of the book. Well thought out story, complex, and very entertaining.
My Rating: 4/5. The love affairs, the intimate moments could have been fewer and the other characters apart from Flick and Dieter better described to build a connect with them.
All in all, a good read hooks you to it as the story unfolds. Pick your copy today :) :)
With Love,
Megha S.
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