The Eight

4 stars to Katherine Neville's The Eight. I stumbled upon this one by hearing about book #2's release and had to start first from the beginning. I'm so glad I did.Characters are well developed. Plot is intricate. Suspense is on target. Story-telling and narration are rich. I want a third book in the series!It's all about a chess match. In theory. But in reality. Russian history. Clever moves and alliances. Family connections. Politics. Strong motivation. Good, thought provoking suspense.

Three weeks ago I held a yard sale. To pass the time I picked up this book I'd never seen from a box of books none of which I'd ever read and none of which I remember buying.Of the many surreal happenings of that day one of the most strange was when, immediately after reading the first page, a well-groomed homeless man or a poorly groomed homed man rode past on a bike. He looked over and upon seeing The Eight lurched off his bike stumbled to my gate and, grasping it with all the force and desper [...]

Sinceramente, me ha encantado!

Katherine Neville, The Eight (Ballantine, 1988)This novel has achieved almost cult status in some circles, and many people consider it one of the best adventure novels ever written. It's a useful way to separate folks you know into two categories: those who are more interested in plot, and those who are more interested in writing.The plot is pretty darn good, when it comes right down to it. The novel takes place in two parallel times, the first being 1972 and the second the years during and afte [...]

I was told by several people whose books tastes I generally respect that I would love this book - sadly, that wasn't the case. I found it tiresome, hard to follow, and the writing was almost impossible to slog through in several places. The characters were never fully developed, I never got invested in any of the characters, and I found the book too plot-driven to an irritating degree - with too many historical elements "dropped in" (almost like name dropping) in order to tie the events to histo [...]

This book was the first of its kind: a historical thriller/whodunnit/magical story that was published in 1988. In a way, all the similar books that have come after (Dan Brown, Kostova's The Historian) are following in Neville's footsteps. If you read it now, it may seem flat in comparison with these later works, which have taken a genre that in many ways Neville created and taken it to new levels. However, I'm giving it this rating because I still remember back more than two decades to my first [...]

FLASH! Definition of the word "thriller" changes. Now the word "thriller" can be deemed to include slow moving, overly convoluted stories that wander from point to point with little actual plot covered!Yes we have another story here in the vein of The Da Vinci Code. (I have been informed that this book was written in '88. I had originally said it was "apparently inspired by said Da Vinci Code". My error. That said, it doesn't make the book any better.) Taking place in both the past and the futur [...]

The two more recent books that most closely resemble The Eight are The Da Vinci Code and Kate Mosse's The Labyrinth, but I found The Eight a more enjoyable read than either of them. The novel is utterly audacious in its (ab)use of historical characters, completely, joyfully implausible in its plotting, and I'm not certain whether the language of Romantic page-turners the author makes frequent use of ("dear reader, little did I know that in two hours' time I would be running for my life trying to [...]

Iskreno, ne znam koju bih ocenu dao sad da je pročitam al te godine, kada mi je dopala šaka, knjiga me je toliko raspametila tako da sam joj se vraćao još dva puta. Pa stoga pet zvezdica.Za Ketrin Nevil možemo slobodno reći da je preteča Den Brauna, a njena priča o tajanstvenoj šahovskoj garnituri Karla Velikog zaista je bila "iskustvo" kojeg se još uvek sećam.

The Eight - ExKathleen NevilleThe Montglane Service, an ornate, jeweled chess set given to Charlemagne by the Moors, is said to hold a code which when deciphered will bring great power. Nations and individuals have schemed to possess all the pieces. As the set is dispersed during the French Revolution, a young novice risks her life to safeguard it. Alternating with her story are the present-day efforts of a U.S. computer expert and a Russian chess master to assemble the set and solve its mystery [...]

FLASH! Definition of the word "thriller" changes. Now the word "thriller" can be deemed to include slow moving, overly convoluted stories that wander from point to point with little actual plot covered!Yes we have another story here in the vein of The Da Vinci Code. (I have been informed that this book was written in '88. I had originally said it was "apparently inspired by said Da Vinci Code". My error. That said, it doesn't make the book any better.) Taking place in both the past and the futur [...]

"The Eight" reads like a student attempting to wow her professor by using as many similies as she can (irony intended). I think Neville chose the name "The Eight," because there are roughly eight sentences per chapter that don't contain a forced, awkward similie.At least that was true for the first 90% of the novel, which was almost Dickensien in its detail. For the last 10%, it is writen more like a short story, with months of time being skiped and important, climactic scenes being rushed into [...]

Sometimes you read a book and find yourself wishing it'll never end. If you want that, this is a book for you. I thought it'd never end, and I don't mean that in a good way. The book has been compared to the DaVinci Code, but I think that's an unfortunate comparison. The story alternates between the 1970's and the late 1700's, both periods linked by the individuals quest for lost ancient knowledge. To me, the action and dangers are contrived, as is the object of the search. If you can get caught [...]

Malo me smeta besmisleni misticizam ali mi se autoričin stil pisanja jako sviđa. zato slabija četvorka.

The absolute worst. Intolerable. The kind of endless, deluded, humorless, self-satisfied, tone-deaf, utterly witless manuscript that I'm sure publishers find in the mail all the time but must NEVER EVER PUBLISH. Picked it up hoping for approximately the literary equivalent of "National Treasure," instead got the literary equivalent of diarrhea. That this is beloved by anyone anywhere, and that it ever elicited the press quotes inside the front cover, absolutely boggles my mind. There is NO dimen [...]

Read on the WondrousBooks blog.Long story short: I got this book from NetGalley and I was unbelievably excited about it. In the end, it took me entirely too many weeks to finish it and now I have to send it to the "mediocre at best" shelf.Now let me elaborate.The story of The Eight seemed very compelling: a mysterious chess set, a game that has been going on for ages, two female characters going on the same quest, set apart by 200 years of chasing, a giant battle of good and evil including hist [...]

I read this book for the first time in 1992 when I was fourteen. I just finished rereading it. I dug up my copy when I moved to NYC 2 years ago and had been curious to pick it up again since then - partly because I had vague recollections of a couple of hot sex scenes, but largely because over a decade after I originally read it, there was a complete cultural explosion centering around another book featuring ancient secrets playing out amid high-paced modern day intrigue, namely The Da Vinci Cod [...]

4 stars--I really liked it.There are some warnings I feel I should give about this book before recommending it to people:1. It's about a magic chess set. Yes, literally. 2. The writing is solid, but not great. (There are some dated elements of racism and fat shaming, but these are mild.)3. The historical facts are shaky.Despite all these things, though, I really liked this book. It was a nonstop adventure, with lots of action--the perfect summer read. There is both a modern and a historical narr [...]

Esta novela se merece sus 5 estrellas por tres razones: En primer lugar es un libro completamente adictivo, no se puede dejar de leer, en mi caso esperaba con ansia tener un momento para continuar la lectura; la intriga, el misterio y los acontecimientos están tan bien hilvanados que atrapan desde el primer momento. En segundo lugar este libro tiene un mérito que no es tan común como uno desearía, y es que deja mucho más que el sabor de una buena lectura, también alimenta nuestra cultura. [...]

Da nije nekih malih preterivanja u "sadašnjosti", bila bi čista petica. Odlična knjiga. Nisam imao vremena za čitanje, ali sam zato dve trećine knjige progutao za dan (i jednu noć do 4.30). Jednostavno, jedna od onih knjiga koje vam ne dozvoljavaju da ih ispustite iz ruku.

Old book too. Please don't mind me. Keep reading your things.

Along with Shantaram, reviewed previously, this is a book that spoke to me. Grabbed me and wound its magic around me, seeping into my soul. I have probably read it at least ten times and several sections more than that.Is it literary genius? No. Is it well written and engrossing? Yes. Fast paced, can’t be put down? Yes. Is it perfect? No. The concept is so good though it had me wanting to rewrite and re-imagine parts of it, trying to think of ways of making the chess game metaphor stronger.In [...]

I would give this book more than 5 stars if I could. The plot Katherine Neville created with The Eight is incredible, intertwined with history and myth and science. Her characters are wonderful, and she does a great job of keeping us wondering until the end who is really on the "good" side. As a writer, I am truly stunned by the intricacy of this plot. Anyone who enjoyed The Da Vinci Code should enjoy The Eight, and it is a better book, in my opinion. A must read, especially for writers learning [...]

This book had such a great plot, but it was just so badly executed. It follows Cat Velis, a computer expert in the 70s who, as punishment for not getting involved in something underhanded at work, gets put on an assignment to Algeria. Before she leaves she attends a New Year's party, where she meets a fortune teller who gives her a cryptic riddle involving her date of birth and "the eight". Cat finds out that the riddle is linked to Charlemagne's legendary chess set, the Montglane service. This [...]

I read The Eight a long time ago, and loved it. It's happened before with Open Road books on Netgalley – I like to request books I know and give a bit of a boost to their reissue. It's also nice to know that I'm going to like a book going in rather than taking the gamble a Netgalley book usually is. Unfortunately, this time it didn't work so well. The first half or so was a wild ride, smart and fun and fascinating, and I kept thinking this is what The DaVinci Code so very much wanted to be. Bu [...]

I don't even know what to say about his book.It had so much potential but failed to deliver it the right way.There are two female leads-Mireille,who lives in the 18th century,and is actually a really cool character,and Catherine Velis,who lives in the 70s,and is a really irritating character.I just didn't like her,my biggest problem with her is that she's a freaking know-it-all-''Oh I don't know anything about Algeria but I know that'' or ''Oh I don't know anything about chess but I know that''. [...]

I've had The Eight on the TBR shelf next to my bed for two or three years. I got it right around the time I had just finished reading The Da Vinci Code and the blurb on the back compared it to Brown's book and the Bookcrosser who gave me the book had liked the intricacies of the plot.This 600 page mystery involves a formula for an elixir of life, a rare chess set and some Cold War era espionage. The story jumps between the close of the 18th century and "modern day" 1972. To make the chess themes [...]

I was given this novel to read, as a similar level of enjoyment as The DaVinci Code.I'm here to say, not even close.It has all the hallmarks that lead to an enjoyable read for me - historical figures, layered storylines, small details that add to great importance as the story develops, and zzzzzzLet me state that I enjoy playing chess. However, reading about it is something of a completely different nature. Figures, playing methodologies, inside references, et al just made my eyes glaze over.I n [...]

it's a bit complex and confusing because it has many characteres and many significant facts but apart from that it's nice book

4 Good Good Good Stars (προς 5) . Επιτέλους! Το τελείωσα! Μετά από ένα μήνα διαβάσματος! Τι να πω για αυτό το βιβλίο??Τα λόγια είναι περιττά! Πολύ καλό! Συγκλονιστικό! Δύσκολο να το αφήσω στο τέλος. Το λάτρεψα με λίγα λόγια. Όμως θα μου πεις αφού το λάτρεψες γιατί 4 αστέρια. Λοιπόν, ας αρχίσω [...]