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Holistic Guidance - A Place Called Freedom
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List Price: $7.99
Our Price: $7.99
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Fawcett
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Mass Market Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.914
EAN: 9780449225158
ISBN: 0449225151
Label: Fawcett
Manufacturer: Fawcett
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 464
Publication Date: 1996-06-30
Publisher: Fawcett
Release Date: 1996-06-30
Studio: Fawcett
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Editorial Reviews:
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Sentenced to a life of misery in the Scottish coal mines, twenty-one-year-old Mack McAsh hungers for escape. His only ally: beautiful high-born Lizzie Hallim, who is trapped in her own kind of hell.
In 1766, from the teeming streets of London to the infernal hold of a slave ship headed for the American colonies to a sprawling Virginia plantation, two restless young people, separated by politics and position, are bound by their search for a place called freedom....
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: A place called freedom
Comment: The main protagonists are Mack McAsh, a coal miner and Lizzie Hallim, a high-born young woman, who has to marry a rich man to save her family. Their love story develops over the course of the novel, as the story progresses. Mack is a young coal miner, a very strong, stubborn, hot-blooded and intelligent guy. He is a property of Sir George Jamisson, who owns the coal mines in the village called Heugh in Scotland. Mack works extremely hard in in the cruel and dangerous coalfields. However, he does not want to accept his fate. He never loses his passion for freedom. Mack challenges his owner and flees to London, where he works as a coal heaver and quickly becomes a leader of the heavers. Meanwhile, Lizzie gets married to Sir George's son, Captain Jay Jamisson, and they move to live in London. Then Sir George gives them a tobacco plantation in Virginia as a wedding present. In London, Mack accidentally gets involved in a riot and is sentenced to be transported to Virginia. In America, Lizzie and Mack flee together and fight for their freedom in the western wilderness.
The book is too predictable and the plots are simple. There are too many coincidences and the ending is weak. I believe this book is definitely not Mr Follett's best. However, it's a fast read and quite entertaining. It also briefly but interestingly introduces the turbulent politics on 1760s Scotland, England and America.
I would strongly recommend other books by the same author, including "The pillars of the earth" and "World without end". Those books are great!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Utterly unremarkable, mediocre novel
Comment: I've never read a lot of Ken Follett's work. His two historical fiction novels, World Without End and Pillars of the Earth picqued my interest and led me to delve a little deeper into his earlier efforts. I must say after reading this novel that I was quite disappointed.
A Place Called Freedom is at best quite mediocre. There is virtually nothing to recommend it above hundreds of other similar books. There were flashes of interest concerning mining conditions and southern plantation practices in the mid-18th century, but by and large it was utterly unremarkable.
Hard working, ambitious, intelligent Scottish miner, spends 400 pages being attracted to a young open minded highly sexed heiress both in Scotland and over seas in pre-revolutionary America. I wonder how it ends?
Customer Rating:
Summary: A Place Called Freedom
Comment: As always, another one of Ken Follett's books that I loved. This book takes you back to Scotland in the 1700's. Even though the book may have had some predictable parts, it was hard to put this book down. The story begins in the coal mines of Scotland and takes you through a beautifully told story of love, lust, greed and envy. A must read for all of Ken Follett fans.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Why such a dull effort
Comment: While I think it would be difficult for Follett to top a few of his own previous works, this novel falls far short of what I would have expected from such a detail-oriented writer.
The hardcover book was misleading by its sheer size, since one might expect a deep, intense story to unwind over seven or eight hundred pages. It's actually less than four hundred. The jacket also teased me with visions of a long epic spanning several decades, as Follett did so brilliantly with "The Pillars of the Earth," or as in the style of Michener with any one of his books.
As I ploughed through the pages, I kept waiting for a surprise situation to develop. As mentioned by other reviewers, the book is highly predictable, and contains a lot of flat action narrative that I guess is supposed to excite the reader. By the last twenty or so pages, the book had gotten ridiculous and I was skimming over it all just to get it over with.
This book is totally forgettable. What a shame.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Freedom is not necessarily a place but a state of Mind
Comment: I picked this book up at the Madrid Airport on a business trip. I was immediately engrossed, and couldn't wait to turn the next page, reminded me of my independent Scotch Irish roots, and getting to America was so refreshing. A great ,with wild ride with the good, bad and the ugly, in a turbulent, but hopeful time. The love story gives it some glue also.
A easy and entertaining read.
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