So Philip's devotion is kind of alien to me and yet he's probably the best character I've ever created.’ Prior Philip is Ken Follett's favourite character in the Kingsbridge novels ‘I knew as soon as I started The Pillars of the Earth that there had to be at least one sincere, admirable Christian in the story. I thought 'Oh my goodness, I don't think I could ever write another story.' Happily, I did.’ ‘At the end of The Pillars of the Earth, I felt a kind of imagination fatigue. With nearly 1,000 pages and over 400,000 words, The Pillars of the Earth took Ken three years and three months to write. The Pillars of the Earth was the most challenging book Ken Follett has ever written It occurred to me that one day it might be a good idea to write a story that would explain how the cathedral fitted into medieval life and why these people built these cathedrals.’

So I began to read books about the Middle Ages, about the people who built the cathedrals – the men and women. They had terrible food and awful clothes and they spent so much money and effort building these buildings that we still go and look at. I would spend a couple of days looking around these buildings. I started thinking 'why did they build it? Why did medieval people want one of these?' I mean medieval people had nothing – they slept on the floor, they lived in wooden houses that were drafty and cold. ‘I was interested in cathedrals just as a hobby for ten years before I started writing The Pillars of the Earth. Whilst on an assignment, Ken visited Peterborough Cathedral and soon cathedral visiting became a hobby of his. The Kingsbridge novels were inspired by cathedralsīefore becoming a full-time writer, Ken Follett worked as a reporter for London's Evening News.

Ken follett world without end series