Jackdaws by Ken Follett
Published October 7, 2013

Book info
- Title
- Author Ken Follett
- Year
- Genres
Thoughts
The previous Ken Follett wartime thriller I read was all about Brits trying to catch a German spy in their midst, across the English country and up in to Scotland. This time, it was about plucky Brits infiltrating German-occupied France, which almost makes us the bad guys considering the setting of the book.
I found this one slightly harder to read, particularly as a lot of the focus is on torturing and the best way of extracting information from people. It’s clearly a part of the war and not something you can really shy away from, but I did find it hard-going. It’s interesting that Follett doesn’t necessarily demonise the anti-hero. There are plenty of Germans in this case that are not very nice, but we get so much detail about the main guy’s life and thoughts that it’s not so easy to just make a snap decision to despise him.
In the end, the victory is secured even if it is not as easy as they may have hoped, which is exactly the bits that make the book interesting!
Rating: Unrated