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阅读肯·福萊特 Ken Follett在小说之家的作品!!! |
福萊特在英特網上有自己的網頁。目前他與世界上數以萬計的讀者在互聯網上保持着緊密聯繫。
肯·福萊特的第一部暢銷書《針眼》(Eye of the Needle)創作於70年代中期。該書講的是代號為「針眼」的德國間諜在英國的一段險故事。1944年盟軍定下在法國北部起進攻的日期，為使計如期執行，最高司令部决定在英國東部地區製造大批部隊集結的假象。英國人搭起衹有衹不過有房頂沒有墻壁的房子，製造充氣的坦，用紙做成許多噴氣式戰機。這假象真的蒙騙德國的偵察機，德國在諾曼底的防衛力量明顯薄弱，最終使盟軍登陸成功。但是代號為「針眼」的德國特工早就在英國得知此事，他决心把情報送往柏林。
福萊特的《針眼》在美國一炮打響，很快被改編成電視劇，目前該小說已被譯成三十多文字，銷售量達一千萬册以上。入選“美國推理作協會”（The Mystery Writers of America，簡稱MWA）評選的一百部最佳推理小說。
Early life
Follett was born on 5 June 1949 in Cardiff, Wales. He was the first child of Martin Follett, a tax inspector, and Lavinia (Veenie) Follett, who went on to have three further children. Barred from watching movies and television by his devout born-again Christian parents, he developed an early interest in reading but remained an indifferent student until he entered his teens. His family moved to London when he was ten years old and he began applying himself to his studies at Harrow Weald Grammar School and Poole Technical College, and won admission in 1967 to University College London, where he studied philosophy and became involved in centre-left politics.
[edit]Marriage and early success
He married his first wife, Mary, in 1968, and their son Emanuele was born in the same year. After graduation in the autumn of 1970 Follett took a three-month post-graduate course in journalism and went to work as a trainee reporter in Cardiff on the South Wales Echo. After three years in Cardiff he returned to London as a general-assignment reporter for the Evening News. Finding the work unchallenging he eventually left journalism for publishing and became, by the late 1970s, deputy managing director of the small London publisher Everest Books. He also began writing fiction during evenings and weekends as a hobby. Later he said he began writing books when he needed extra money to fix his car, and the publisher's advance a fellow journalist had been paid for a thriller was the sum required for the repairs. Success came gradually at first but the publication of Eye of the Needle in 1978 made him both wealthy and internationally famous. Each of Follett's subsequent novels has also become a best-seller, ranking high on the New York Times Best Seller list; a number have been adapted for the screen.
Follett became involved, during the late 1970s, in the activities of Britain's Labour Party. In the course of his political activities he met the former Barbara Broer, a Labour official, who became his second wife in 1984. She was elected as a Member of Parliament in 1997, representing Stevenage. She was re-elected in both 2001 and in 2005, but did not run in the 2010 general election after becoming embroiled in the United Kingdom Parliamentary expenses scandal, where she was among the MPs found to have overclaimed the highest amount of expenses. Follett himself remains a prominent Labour supporter and fundraiser as well as a prominent Blairite. In 2010 he was the largest donor to Ed Balls' campaign to become leader of the Labour Party, saying "Ed Balls is the only Labour leadership candidate who offers a path to economic growth; his time at the treasury, with low borrowing and high growth, shows he is the true candidate of the centre in this leadership election. Only Ed offers a broad appeal to all voters and is not afraid to stand up to the left wing of the party, much like Tony Blair."
Public life
On 15 September 2010, Follett, along with 54 other public figures, signed an open letter published in The Guardian, stating their opposition to Pope Benedict XVI's state visit to the UK.