Don't read the cover blurb! Or the title. Or be spoiled!
Written: May 24 '09
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Good characters, prose that will keep you hooked
Cons: Too many coincidences, too obvious plotting. Blurb gives away too much
The Bottom Line: A good novel that would be great with a few minor revisions.
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| hist's Full Review: Ken Follett - Hornet Flight |
Anybody who knows me knows that I'm a World War II spy novel fan. There's just something about the old time feel of these books that makes them much more interesting than modern-day ones. So when I saw Ken Follett's Hornet Flight in a used book store, I had to pick it up. I loved his previous one, Jackdaws, and figured this one would be good too. I was definitely right about that. Only a few things mar what would otherwise be a terrific thriller that's impossible to put down. It's good despite these flaws.
It's June 1941, and Denmark is under German rule. Thankfully for the residents there, the Germans haven't really cracked down too much and life hasn't changed that drastically for them. On the Danish island of Sande, a secret military complex is housed that could be the key to the British holding out. Britain has been attempting to bomb Germany into submission, as they don't have any other option, but their flights have been massacred by a German Air Force that seemingly knows they're coming. What does this installation have to do with that? And will young Harald Olufsen have to be the one to get word of this to the British? And how will he do this?
The major thing wrong with the book is actually from a marketing point of view. The title and the blurb give way too much away! It makes the first part of the book drag considerably, considering you know a few too many things without even having started the book (and a spoiler warning for those who don't actually read the cover copy, though the title still gives it away):
1) Harald will be the one who has to finish the job of getting the information to the British
2) He'll have to fly an outdated Hornet out of Denmark somehow in order to complete the mission. When Harald first sees the Hornet, very early in the book, we know immediately what's going to happen.
All the rest is just details. While they are wonderful details, I think it hurt the book to know so much about it going in.
Follett does a good job of setting up the main characters, but the plotting is a bit too obvious and one of the storylines goes nowhere. There's Digby Hoare, a man who works in Churchill's office and who has been tasked with finding out why the German Air Force is wating for the British bombers all the time. Follett sets up a potential romance with Hermia Mount, who is able to look past Hoare's fake leg and see the true man inside. But her fiance, Arne Olufsen, is still in Denmark. While Hoare tries, nothing ever really happens with this; it just seems like so much filler in a book that's already ove 500 pages.
That doesn't mean that the characters aren't interesting, though. Harald is a typical 18-year-old schoolboy with hormones to match, into jazz and horrified at what the Nazis are doing around the world, especially at the thought of what they might eventually do to Denmark. Hermia is an English woman who lived in Denmark until the Nazis invaded, and wants to do as much as she can for her adopted country.
Peter Flemming is a cop to whom the law means everything, no matter who is actually creating the laws. The Germans are the masters in Denmark now, so he does their bidding. It's even more delicious for him when he stumbles upon the Danish Underground spy ring and it turns out that two of his family's mortal enemies (the Olufsens) are involved. He thinks that if the cops were allowed to be harsher on the perpetrators of crime, people would be cowed and wouldn't commit crimes. But, as Follett usually does with his main villains (at least in the two books I've read), he gives Flemming a more human side as well. His wife has become almost a walking vegetable due to a car accident (the results of the trial of the perpetrator just feed into his "all criminals should be harshly punished" mindset) and he feels an irresistible attraction to one of his underlings.
There's nothing really wrong with the characters, though some seem a bit thin and there just to do their part in the story. It's the coincidence-laden plot that is the main problem. First, as said before, the setting up of the characters is extremely slow because we already know how the book is ultimately going to turn out. We just don't know how the characters are going to get there. Secondly, as the plot builds to a climax, it's too obvious that Follett is manipulating his characters to appear in the right place at the right time to add tension to the novel. Some of it doesn't seem natural, such as Harald's friend Karen (an aspiring ballerina) having to delay Harald's escape for one day because a virus rips through the ballerina company, giving her a chance to perform for the king. This, of course, gives the bad guys a chance to figure out what's going on and work toward stopping the whole plot.
All that being said, it was still almost impossible to put the book down as I became engaged with the characters and wondering what was going to happen next. Follett's prose keeps you riveted, with very few missteps. This is despite the fact that the plotting got on my nerves occasionally. You do grow to care for some of these characters, and even if their eventual fates seem quite obvious, it's still interesting to read about them. If you like World War II spy novels, you can't really go wrong with Hornet Flight.
Put this in your "not good enough to love; not bad enough to hate" folder. There are definitely more pluses than minuses, though not by a wide margin.
Originally published on Curled Up With a Good Book at www.curledup.com. © David Roy, 2009
Novels by Ken Follett:
Jackdaws
Hornet Flight
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
hist
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Member: David Roy
Location: Vancouver, BC
Reviews written: 723
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