- Pillars of the Earth
- World Without End
- A Column of Fire
The books take place in the 13th century and the back story is about building the great cathedrals in Europe. They are classic, epic masterpieces but deep and exhausting.
I didn't have the energy to tackle a project this size but David was reading the first one, loved it, and we discussed it often.
When I told my friend, Karen, this we said she was reading them as well and dropped off her copy of World Without End at the house for David to borrow.
Early in April, when David was first being diagnosed with what turned out to be a small stoke, Karen showed up at our door distressed and in tears. I got him to the door and they had a long discussion. I thought she was upset about David's health issues - but she wasn't. (I don't know if she even knew about them.)
Karen was at our door because it was April 15th, the day of the Notre-Dame de Paris fire. She didn't know anyone else who would understand the intensity of her feelings about this great cathedral.
Later on David's health issues became critical, then much better, then he died on July 18th. But prior to that, when he was recovering, he went back to reading the second book in the trilogy, World With End, I'm getting ready to return it to Karen. It is 1,103 pages long. The last page he read was 961. I marked it for Karen to see that David almost finished - but not quite.
World Without End, Amen.
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