Pillar of the Sky

by Cecelia Holland

From deep in the mists of time, Cecelia Holland has drawn forth this tale of life on the Salisbury Plain, among the Stone Age Britons who built Stonehenge. It is the story of hunters, of kings and matriarchs, and of one outcast boy who becomes a shaman, burning with a vision that will take shape in mighty pillars of stone.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Historical, British Literature, Prehistoric, Novels, Ancient History

534 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1985

About the author

Pen name used by Elizabeth Eliot Carter.

Cecelia Holland is one of the world's most highly acclaimed and respected historical novelists, ranked by many alongside other giants in that field such as Mary Renault and Larry McMurtry. Over the span of her thirty year career, she's written almost thirty historical novels, including The Firedrake, Rakessy, Two Ravens, Ghost on the Steppe, Death of Attila, Hammer For Princes, The King's Road, Pillar of the Sky, The Lords of Vaumartin, Pacific Street, Sea Beggars, The Earl, The King in Winter, The Belt of Gold, The Serpent Dreamer, The High City, Kings of the North, and a series of fantasy novels, including The Soul Thief, The Witches Kitchen, The Serpent Dreamer, and Varanger. She also wrote the well-known science fiction novel Floating Worlds, which was nominated for a Locus Award in 1975. Her most recent book is a new fantasy novel, Dragon Heart.

Reviews

[hawk · Rating 3 out of 5]

a historical fiction set on Salisbury plain, around Stonehenge.

a village, it's different members, tensions, secrets... the desire for power, and the desire to survive.

seems a story of ambition, men desiring and taking power, peoples of old, traditions and times changing. ideas about the building of Stonehenge, the astrological learning and traditions.

🙂 I quite liked some of the mythologies, and wondered if they were created for this story, or from what/where they were drawn? 🤔

🙂 and I liked Karala, an elder woman and the village storyteller, a strong character who confronts and challenges. tho she sadly dies part way into the book.

😕 I didn't like all the hierarchical power struggles, mostly among men, and the violence enacted towards women and those who are less strong (physically or socially).


🌟 🌟


accessed as an RNIB talking book, nicely read by Ian Craig 🙂

[Megan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another of my all-time favorites, I found this book in the CBU library years ago in high school and took it home because it sounded interesting. I absolutely could not put this book down. During school I recieved detentions for reading in class and not being on task. I read it during dinner and lunch and breakfast. I got limited sleep because I stayed up reading into the early hours of the morning. The way that the authors follows Moloquin from childhood to adulthood left me satisfied and his depiction of the tribe throughout these years dragged me into the book. I swear that for a week during my sophomore year in high school I was in B.C. England watching stone henge constructed and a young outcast's dreams come alive.

[Deborah Pickstone · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have always had Cecelia Holland as a favourite writer and I guess I must have read her back in my teens - but I have read 3 by her this year and it just doesn't gel. It's not bad just doesn't really float my boat. Anyway, this was Stonehenge for the geocaching challenge. I started it in ....August? and I just finished it. Says it all, really - I never leave books!

[Dawn Dorsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Since we know so little about the people who built Stonehenge and the other stone circles scattered about the British Isles and elsewhere about the world. Imaginative authors have long built stories around them. In this one, Cecelia Holland imagines a stone-age society, with very limited trading contact with bronze-age people from the continent, and builds a complex social system led by powerful village chieftains but really controlled by the old women of the villages, who select the new chief, and the storytellers, who preserve the history of the people and teach the children.

In this version, the impossible task is driven by an outcast, who returns to the village of his mother and fascinates the people, even as they hate and fear him. Moloquin, "the unwanted one", is eventually selected as the local chief, and drives his people to build his vision, a huge circle of trimmed and fitted megaliths, on the site of an older, ruined henge which they have always feared, and used as a home for their dead. In the process, Moloquin usurps ever more power unto himself, and overturns the old order of things among the people.

Holland's society and explanation of the engineering feats required are as viable as any other theories out there, and make for an interesting story.

[Sydney Branch · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great story. Accurate to the time, interesting characters, fabulous all around.

[Leah · Rating 2 out of 5]

The world building at the begining was great. It started to fall apart half way through when it turned into a technical manual for how you might build Stonehenge instead of being a story. The last third of the books was so boring.

[Debi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am glad I read this book although I did not particularly like it. Still it was well written and worth the reading. This is not the first book that I am glad I have read although I did not like it. So I am giving it 4 stars. Just because it was not my cuppa does not make it a bad book. Read it. I liked it enough to read it through because educated me and made Me think. It is truly an understandable explanation of how women had their power stolen by the fear and greed of men.The Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett is next.

[Hannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wow, this is a long read, so be prepared. I enjoyed it less and less the more it went on, and was relieved to reach the last page. It’s about 1/3 too long. If I didn’t have such book guilt, I would have given up before the end.

I recently watched a documentary about the latest archaeological findings that help bring new understanding to Stonehenge, and I was so intrigued by it I looked for historical fiction about it.

I enjoyed the world building, the myths, legends and spiritualism of the time, and I really enjoyed the first third of the book. It was well researched and seemed really believable.

However, it’s clear that power corrupts, and it was sad to see Moloquin’s demise and his treatment of those around him. I found it harder and harder to empathize with Moloquin, and by the last third, I just wanted the book to end

[Joel Adamson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. Although the writing is a bit old-fashioned (Holland is still alive, started writing in the sixties, and this was published in 1985) and the language is somewhat grandiose, it's a hell of a story. About not just history, but growth, leadership, politics on a manageable scale, and engineering and astronomy. Not surprised that this is a pillar of historical fiction (along with that other pillar-book from the eighties).

[Wendy Sherrock · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting story, and a change of pace. But it went on too long and I grew bored by the end of it.

[Emelia · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Pillar of the Sky is a most remarkable story of Stonehenge,
and tells the tale of a young cast off child who rises to be a shaman of extraordinary power.
Set in the stone age, Moloquin, the unwanted one, has a vision to link the worlds of shaman and earthly spirituality by building a ring of stones to serve as a gateway between the two worlds. Filled with intrigue, magic, and sacrifice The Pillar of the Sky is a must read book. Cecelia Holland paints an incredible story of strength and perseverance that takes the reader on a journey of epic proportions. One that will move the soul of any reader.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this book when I was a teenager and I remember enjoying the story quite a bit. The story was original and spanned a lifetime. It was the second book I had picked up by Cecelia Holland and I hope to read more of her work in the future.

[Tommy Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent trip back to a simpler but more violent time. Obviously assumes a lot but cracking read all the same.

[Debye · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this way back wonder when and loved it too!! Might reread. (Catching up on past reads).

[April Birchall · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a decent story, too long, yet intriguing. The tale was epic (or at least meant to be). It definitely compares to The Man Who Would Be King.

As our main character, Moloquin, successfully becomes ruler through power and might, he also becomes obsessive with his project, egotistical and entitled by his power. He initially comes in as a hero, saving his people from their destruction, only to later lead them down a path of eventual failure of their society. It was tragic. There are key events that changed his destiny, presenting as a rescue or condemnation. As he struggled to complete his project, he was met with doubt, fear, and competition from those he ruled. He never had a place in society and failed to successfully re-enter and coexist despite his position.

The book was almost a great and tragic tale, but it just didn't hit me the right way. It was a little dirty, so that was a put off. But, where it really failed was spreading the story between characters. It was more interesting to have the knowledge of various persons, but it also lost impact as we moved the spotlight away from Moloquin.

It just wasn't my kind of book.

[Sunhawk · Rating 3 out of 5]

I got a few pages in before I recognized this as a book I read in the past -- "before GoodReads." Subject and title are intriguing, and I want to get this down as "Read" before I get it again.
I remember being fascinated by the story when I read it; I am easily taken by an interesting story, no matter how well told, and this has elements that strongly appeal to me: Stonehenge, pre-history, nepotism v. competence, the power of women and matriarchy whether overt or subterranean ... and so on my first reading I don't think I noticed that the storytelling is a little clunky. Hence 3 stars.

[Craig W. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nice writing. Really enjoyed the speculation on the historical period. What I didn't like was the devolution of the main character who goes from the mother-inspired vibrant rebel, visionary, and social iconoclast to a pathetic double of his tyrannical father. It may be a warning of how power can corrupt, but the plot has been developed in such a way that more strongly suggests we are genetically doomed to repeat the errors of our fathers. I felt that this was weakness in the novel that prevents my giving a higher rating.

[Max · Rating 5 out of 5]

Engaging story of an unwanted human who is elevated to necessity by circumstance, crumbled in their morales while serving their people, and who lost their positive attributes along the way to construct a monument for the ages. A tragic story drenched in historical influence, sickening irony, ancient sociology, fascinating discoveries, mythological themes, and the nature of human ethics in an older time. It is a pleasure to read, and it drives home some interesting thoughts about the cycles of leadership, faith, hate, and love.

[Sabrina · Rating 2 out of 5]

I love Cecelia Holland. I will read all of her books.
I was not engaged in this one, however. At first I was, and was as excited as Moloquin to start his pillar of the sky. But after Ruah passed on, things started to drag for me. I didn't like the person Moloquin became, we lost sight of Shateel (whom I liked) and the story missed a beat.

Not willing to abandon the story, I was glad when I finally got to the last page.

[Angie Kiker · Rating 5 out of 5]

great story of the distant past

This book is a beautiful historical fiction of a time of learning, balance and unbalance. It tells of how change is always, and comes with a new dialectic of effective and ineffective happenings. It is also a story of the need of learning, while maintaining a balance of male and female energy. Beautiful book! Captivating tale. Life and change goes on.

[Joy Jensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Complicated Man

I first came across this book many years ago...since that first read of Pillar of the Sky I have returned several times to read the story of a complicated man trying to find meaning in his life and to give meaning to the lives of the People who he made his own. With each reading I love this book more!

[Frances L. Spradlin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although I appreciate the author's attempt to explain the origins of Stonehenge, this book was a slog to read. All the part about gathering and raising the stones made the story drag.. Plus, scenes changed abruptly with nothing to indicate that the setting was about to be different. Also, the characters' aging and passage of time were badly handled.

[Ruby]

Great satire of how the many flaws and vices of man result in a society full of artifices. The story could very well have served a Rousseauist literature study into the journey of a man, who is born good and who gets corrupted by society (and arguably by his ambitions).

[gwen graves · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent

A really great story.Cecelia Howard's writing is tragic, you can see the people and the building of Stonehenge. Her character of Moloquin shows how a person with a dream can be so totally absorbed with it , that it completely changes him.

[Julia Dawn Mason · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a read!

This book grabs you and you are one with it. Stonehenge is one place that will last long after I am gone .

[Leslie Ross · Rating 3 out of 5]

I usually love her books. But this one was too long and too sad.

[Carole Davidson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting premise, but too predictable. Editing need to add some page brakes. The story just suddenly changed at a paragraph. Made me have to go back and re-read a section to see if I missed something.

[Rose]

The fictional story of the ancient people who built Stonehenge. Well-developed characters. Very well written.

[Patricia · Rating 3 out of 5]

The mystery surrounding Stonehenge has long fascinated me -- who built it. how, and why? With these questions in mind I anticipated Pillar of the Sky. I can count on one hand the number of books that I started reading but didn't finish and this novel threatened to join that elite group. I did finish but was disappointed. Although the main characters were interesting the story just seemed to plod along at a very slow pace.

No graphic sex or violence

[Trevor Locke · Rating 5 out of 5]

This historical novel was astonishingly good. A story that is believable and clearly based on a deep knowledge of the later Stone Age and early Bronze Age. Strong characters, and gripping plots, but above all an evocation of the life of those who built Stonehenge thousands of years before writing began. A very engaging and enjoyable story full of extraordinary technical detail.