Circle of Days
2025 | Historical Fiction
From the master of epic fiction comes the deeply human story of one of the world’s greatest mysteries: the building of Stonehenge.
A FLINT MINER WITH A GIFT
Seft, a talented flint miner, walks the Great Plain in the high summer heat, to witness the rituals that signal the start of a new year. He is there to trade his stone at the Midsummer Fair, and to find Neen, the girl he loves. Her family live in prosperity and offer Seft an escape from his brutish father and brothers, within their herder community.
A PRIESTESS WHO BELIEVES THE IMPOSSIBLE
Joia, Neen’s sister, is a priestess with a vision and an unmatched ability to lead. As a child, she watches the Midsummer ceremony, enthralled, and dreams of a miraculous new monument, raised from the biggest stones in the world. But trouble is brewing among the hills and woodlands of the Great Plain.
A MONUMENT THAT WILL DEFINE A CIVILISATION
Joia’s vision of a great stone circle, assembled by the divided tribes of the Plain, will inspire Seft and become their life’s work. But as drought ravages the earth, mistrust grows between the herders, farmers and woodlanders – and an act of savage violence leads to open warfare…
Truly ambitious in scope, Circle of Days invites you to join master storyteller Ken Follett in exploring one of the greatest mysteries of our age: Stonehenge.
“A dramatic, complex imagining of the origins of Stonehenge. . . Vintage Follett. His fans will be pleased.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“An engrossing tale of the neolithic British Isles and the construction of the Stonehenge monument. . . [Follett] keeps the reader invested in the story with well-developed characters.”
—Publishers Weekly
“The king of epic historical fiction weaves a rich tale about the construction of Stonehenge, as the divided tribes of the Great Plain struggle to suppress their enmity whilst building the iconic monument.”
—Waterstones
“There could be no better match between author and subject than Ken Follett writing about Stonehenge. His trademark blend of the intensely human and the monumentally epic works to perfection here – a superb novel.”
—Lee Child
“A tour de force – Follett so brilliantly and engagingly immerses us in a world and society at the time of the creation of Stonehenge that feels indelibly real. It utterly grips and fascinates, and made me realize that apart from technology, so very little has changed between then and now in how we behave.”
—Peter James
“A must-read, wonderful saga for anyone who’s ever gazed at Stonehenge in awe. The monument and the people that built it, brought to life like never before.”
—Chris Hadfield
“A hugely enjoyable family saga. Forget the phone. Books like this are a sort of anti-social media: just a reader turning pages, lost in a different world. Follett is one of the great storytellers.”
—Conn Iggulden
“Ken Follett is unquestionably a master storyteller but his unique skill is animating the ordinary lives that history too often fails to record. In Circle of Days, like Pillars of the Earth, he breathes life into iconic stone, to fill history’s silences with living breathing people.”
—Mariella Frostrup
“Another fabulous tale from the master storyteller, packed with passion, heartache and compelling historical detail. No-one does it better.”
—Ed Balls