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A review by brannonkrkhuang
Winter of the World by Ken Follett
1.0
I made it through two chapters of this book before returning it to the library as fast as I possibly could. We have some big flaws here that I couldn't overlook.
Let's get this straight - this happened in chapter TWO! Greg is the son of Lev who is a big movie guy and a scummy business man. Greg goes with Lev on some trip and Lev says he has a gift for Greg in his room. Greg goes to his room where there is a girl who wants to get a job as an actress. Yeah, you know where this is going. Greg then literally thinks about how so many girls want to be actors but the only way for them to become actors is to have sex, and Greg and his father are the lucky benefactors. So Greg and Lev are rapists. Wow. OK. This girl, of course, turns out to be sixteen, which means Lev hired an underage girl to fuck his son in order for her to get an acting job, and even though at first it was just business, after one weekend she is conveniently in love with Greg. That is bullshit. This is insane and evil, and it’s portrayed as completely acceptable. What the fuck is happening. Also, she’s one of the few (possibly only? I stopped at chapter two so idk) Black characters in this whole book. They talk about how one of the only roles she could get in the movies was as a maid because of her skin color. Insane. And then Lev doesn't even deliver on his end of the bargain. He starts telling her, “oh, I’m still looking for the right part.” This is where it gets even worse, not only did Lev use his position of power to force a sixteen year old girl to have sex with his son, he also used her to frame his business competition as a rapist so that he could buy up his competition's movie theaters for a cheap price. And of course his son Greg just admires the hell out of his dad for his “business savvy.” Literally the book says, “Greg’s admiration for his father went up another notch” after watching his dad accuse a man of rape in order to shame him out of business, using a desperate sixteen year old girl in the process, and then present that same child to his son as a “gift” aka a child prostitute, which his son sees no problem with, and we, the reader, aren’t supposed to see a problem with either because she instantly falls in love with Greg. Really. That’s bullshit. Fuck Ken Follett. I’m about to go back and give the first book in the series one star too after this because nobody should read this shit. And who, in the end, faces consequences for what Lev has done? His daughter. Everybody decides they hate her because of what Lev did. It’s just so dumb. After the father/son rape trip, this sixteen year old girl is so in love with Greg that she secretly moves closer to Greg so she can be with him, but when Lev finds out, he makes her move away, and Greg is so sad that she's gone that the chapter ends with him sitting there crying. He was so ready to take her to the ball and nobly fight off any racists who would complain that she was Black. Isn't Greg such a great guy? I can imagine that Greg's story going forward involves him tracking her down and trying to keep the relationship going. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but if I'm right - there's no way I'm reading that shit. She was taken advantage of and the author justified it by saying they fell in love after one weekend of sex. I do not tolerate male author self-insert justification for rape.
My second issue with this book takes place in chapter one, when Walter is trying to save Germany from electing Hitler. He talks to the Catholic party, and this guy from the Catholic party is saying, "I came from Russia ten years ago, but we had to leave my father there because he was sent to an arctic prison for having the book Robinson Crusoe. I don't know if he's still alive." Walter responded, “we all hate the Bolsheviks but the Nazis COULD be worse." They COULD BE???? What??? Also, yeah right, you expect me to believe the Bolsheviks were imprisoning people indefinitely in arctic prisons for owning Robinson Crusoe??? Be serious. And because of that, this guy voted for Hitler, who started burning books and attempted to commit genocide. Good job, guy from the catholic party. You really nailed it. Your popsicle father would be proud.
I really can't believe Follett's portrayal of the Soviet Union. He's trying to make them the villains even when they're about to be the ones who play the decisive role in WINNING WWII, in DEFEATING the Nazis. That's crazy. In the last book, Follett completely glossed over the fact that British Imperialism in India alone killed over 100 million people, not to mention the horrors they committed and the deaths they caused in Africa, but now he's going to try to portray the Soviet Union as the most evil thing of all time? His portrayal of Britain in book one does not paint it as an evil empire, which it absolutely was, but he'll portray the Soviet Union as evil from the get-go, even when they formed as a people's revolution against oppression and are about to sacrifice millions of lives in the fight against fascism. I'm sure he's going to go into the horrible death toll of communism, while ignoring the fact that British imperialism killed WAY more people, and just ignoring the death toll of capitalism completely. Surely there will be no acknowledgement of the fact that the U.S. was founded on slavery and genocide. I bet the book series ends with everybody celebrating the fall of the Soviet Union. I can't imagine how he portrays Castro in book three, but I expect him to fail at it spectacularly. Fidel Castro overthrew a U.S.-backed military dictator who was abusing the Cuban people. Castro and the people rose up and took power from him, and then the U.S. embargoed Cuba and tried to assassinate Castro over 500 times because the U.S. is the villain of central America. I appreciated the class struggle portrayed in the first book, but I don't have faith that it will last. I suspect this series devolves into, "Look at how great politics are in the US and Britain! Look at how much democracy there is! The people have the right to express their voice through voting for one insanely rich person who doesn't represent them or another insanely rich person who doesn't represent them EVEN MORE! Yes folks, it doesn't get any better than this! Workers of the world, don't bother uniting! Just vote really hard! Don't worry about the fact that nearly all of your elected officials are millionaires and therefore do not represent you. Just keep voting for them." Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, because I'd be glad to be wrong. This is just the vibe I'm getting. Anyway, I'm still done reading this series.
Let's get this straight - this happened in chapter TWO! Greg is the son of Lev who is a big movie guy and a scummy business man. Greg goes with Lev on some trip and Lev says he has a gift for Greg in his room. Greg goes to his room where there is a girl who wants to get a job as an actress. Yeah, you know where this is going. Greg then literally thinks about how so many girls want to be actors but the only way for them to become actors is to have sex, and Greg and his father are the lucky benefactors. So Greg and Lev are rapists. Wow. OK. This girl, of course, turns out to be sixteen, which means Lev hired an underage girl to fuck his son in order for her to get an acting job, and even though at first it was just business, after one weekend she is conveniently in love with Greg. That is bullshit. This is insane and evil, and it’s portrayed as completely acceptable. What the fuck is happening. Also, she’s one of the few (possibly only? I stopped at chapter two so idk) Black characters in this whole book. They talk about how one of the only roles she could get in the movies was as a maid because of her skin color. Insane. And then Lev doesn't even deliver on his end of the bargain. He starts telling her, “oh, I’m still looking for the right part.” This is where it gets even worse, not only did Lev use his position of power to force a sixteen year old girl to have sex with his son, he also used her to frame his business competition as a rapist so that he could buy up his competition's movie theaters for a cheap price. And of course his son Greg just admires the hell out of his dad for his “business savvy.” Literally the book says, “Greg’s admiration for his father went up another notch” after watching his dad accuse a man of rape in order to shame him out of business, using a desperate sixteen year old girl in the process, and then present that same child to his son as a “gift” aka a child prostitute, which his son sees no problem with, and we, the reader, aren’t supposed to see a problem with either because she instantly falls in love with Greg. Really. That’s bullshit. Fuck Ken Follett. I’m about to go back and give the first book in the series one star too after this because nobody should read this shit. And who, in the end, faces consequences for what Lev has done? His daughter. Everybody decides they hate her because of what Lev did. It’s just so dumb. After the father/son rape trip, this sixteen year old girl is so in love with Greg that she secretly moves closer to Greg so she can be with him, but when Lev finds out, he makes her move away, and Greg is so sad that she's gone that the chapter ends with him sitting there crying. He was so ready to take her to the ball and nobly fight off any racists who would complain that she was Black. Isn't Greg such a great guy? I can imagine that Greg's story going forward involves him tracking her down and trying to keep the relationship going. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but if I'm right - there's no way I'm reading that shit. She was taken advantage of and the author justified it by saying they fell in love after one weekend of sex. I do not tolerate male author self-insert justification for rape.
My second issue with this book takes place in chapter one, when Walter is trying to save Germany from electing Hitler. He talks to the Catholic party, and this guy from the Catholic party is saying, "I came from Russia ten years ago, but we had to leave my father there because he was sent to an arctic prison for having the book Robinson Crusoe. I don't know if he's still alive." Walter responded, “we all hate the Bolsheviks but the Nazis COULD be worse." They COULD BE???? What??? Also, yeah right, you expect me to believe the Bolsheviks were imprisoning people indefinitely in arctic prisons for owning Robinson Crusoe??? Be serious. And because of that, this guy voted for Hitler, who started burning books and attempted to commit genocide. Good job, guy from the catholic party. You really nailed it. Your popsicle father would be proud.
I really can't believe Follett's portrayal of the Soviet Union. He's trying to make them the villains even when they're about to be the ones who play the decisive role in WINNING WWII, in DEFEATING the Nazis. That's crazy. In the last book, Follett completely glossed over the fact that British Imperialism in India alone killed over 100 million people, not to mention the horrors they committed and the deaths they caused in Africa, but now he's going to try to portray the Soviet Union as the most evil thing of all time? His portrayal of Britain in book one does not paint it as an evil empire, which it absolutely was, but he'll portray the Soviet Union as evil from the get-go, even when they formed as a people's revolution against oppression and are about to sacrifice millions of lives in the fight against fascism. I'm sure he's going to go into the horrible death toll of communism, while ignoring the fact that British imperialism killed WAY more people, and just ignoring the death toll of capitalism completely. Surely there will be no acknowledgement of the fact that the U.S. was founded on slavery and genocide. I bet the book series ends with everybody celebrating the fall of the Soviet Union. I can't imagine how he portrays Castro in book three, but I expect him to fail at it spectacularly. Fidel Castro overthrew a U.S.-backed military dictator who was abusing the Cuban people. Castro and the people rose up and took power from him, and then the U.S. embargoed Cuba and tried to assassinate Castro over 500 times because the U.S. is the villain of central America. I appreciated the class struggle portrayed in the first book, but I don't have faith that it will last. I suspect this series devolves into, "Look at how great politics are in the US and Britain! Look at how much democracy there is! The people have the right to express their voice through voting for one insanely rich person who doesn't represent them or another insanely rich person who doesn't represent them EVEN MORE! Yes folks, it doesn't get any better than this! Workers of the world, don't bother uniting! Just vote really hard! Don't worry about the fact that nearly all of your elected officials are millionaires and therefore do not represent you. Just keep voting for them." Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, because I'd be glad to be wrong. This is just the vibe I'm getting. Anyway, I'm still done reading this series.