The Eight

A Novel

By: Katherine Neville

Narrated by: Susan Denaker

Length: 25 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

New York City, 1972 - A dabbler in mathematics and chess, Catherine Velis is also a computer expert for a Big Eight accounting firm. Before heading off to a new assignment in Algeria, Cat has her palm read by a fortune teller. The woman warns Cat of danger. Then an antiques dealer approaches Cat with a mysterious offer: He has an anonymous client who is trying to collect the pieces of an ancient chess service, purported to be in Algeria. If Cat can bring the pieces back, there will be a generous reward.

The south of France, 1790 - Mireille de Rémy and her cousin Valentine are young novices at the fortress-like Montglane Abbey. With France aflame in revolution, the two girls burn to rebel against constricted convent life - and their means of escape is at hand. Buried deep within the abbey are pieces of the Montglane Chess Service, once owned by Charlemagne. Whoever reassembles the pieces can play a game of unlimited power. But to keep the Game a secret from those who would abuse it, the two young women must scatter the pieces throughout the world....

And there's more to the story! Don't miss the sequel, The Fire.

©1988 Katherine Neville (P)2007 Books on Tape

Critic reviews

"Even readers with no interest in chess will be swept up into this astonishing fantasy-adventure....destined to become a cult classic." (Publishers Weekly)

“With alchemical skill, Neville blends modern romance, historical fiction, and medieval mystery...and comes up with gold.” (People)

“A big, rich, two-tiered confection of a novel...a rousing, amusing game.” (San Francisco Chronicle)

"Readers thrilled by The Da Vinci Code will relish the multi-layered secrets of The Eight.” (Matthew Pearl, author of The Dante Club)

Complex Thriller

Perhaps overly complex to the point of requiring you to not think too deeply about it or it would seem ridiculous. Somehow a global game between two opposing sides for control of a chess set that brings with it great power has been fought for over 1000 years in secret by a large number of players and it stayed secret. I have long had a personal standard when judging the latest conspiracy theory. The more people who would need to be involved to make it work the less believable it is as a secret conspiracy. Humans by nature do not keep secrets well. How the vast conspiracy in this book could maintain secrecy over 1000 years with all the people involved is not easy to believe. Hence the need to not think too deeply about it.
I liked the overall story and the Dan Brown like chase to find the chess set over two separate time periods.
I liked the mixing in of many historical figures. I don't know if it helped to know several of the major players of the French Revolution to follow the complex nature of the book, but it didn't hurt beyond making you have a little advance knowledge of some things that might happen.
I liked the reader. She had a good voice to listen to tell the story and did a reasonable job differentiating voices/accents of the many characters.
I wish the book had a more present villain. to make the threat faced by the main characters seem more real. A book like this benefits from having a character you hate and want to see defeated.
Many other reviewers make the comparison to Dan Brown and I can see why. Brown tries to claim his books are based on historically. and scientifically accurate information in a fictional setting when that is clearly not the case if you know your history or basic science. Neville seems better grounded in her history and never claims the science is anything other than a fantasy element within the story.
I would strongly recommend not reading the synopsis of the sequel as it gives away some major spoilers for this book.

A very good book to read with history and intrigue

I found the story to be very well written. I love the way the story starts out and then it comes full circle.

Very good

Well done! A little alchemy; a little history; a little chase across the desert. All with female main characters.

This was written before the Dan Brown books and written better, in my opinion.

It was enjoyable and the narration of the audiobook portrayed the characters well.

I like long books so the length was perfect. It kept my interest throughout, something big books can't always maintain.

Beginning and end - awesome; in-between: slow

Any additional comments?

Quite something that I always keep looking for, lot of twists and revelations that make you go

Whoaaaa!!!

**************Contains spoilers*****************

The beginning was really good, it almost made me give 5 stars until I reached the point after Valentine's death, where it started the tales of other historically prominent characters being interested in the Montglane chess service.

I've never been appreciative about switching back and forth between past and present, but this one wasn't that confusing since the characters in both the time spans were entirely different (18 and 20th century) which also meant narrator reading it in different accents (French and English).
Up to 40% of the book, I was very much interested but soon after Valentine's death as I mentioned before, it got very slow and to be frank it felt too long. There is certainly a low point in the book but once you get through it, it again becomes interesting, its worth reading.
Even until the last couple of pages, I was like "What just happened :-o"

Although I was a little unconvinced with the revelation of Mini being Mireille and her living for 200 years at the end, but who cares I had fun reading. I still feel this book could have been a lot shorter without the involvement of prominent historical personalities. Having said that, I also agree that literary work is not my cup of tea, I'm not capable of reading it.

The narrator was excellent with quite a lot of variations in the narration for each character and accents so accurate, as far as I think.

Great plot, great story, interesting puzzles, yet I'd need to gather a lot of time and courage to read such a huge book next time. I'd prefer listening+reading I guess.

Best book ever.

Would you listen to The Eight again? Why?

Yes. Fascinating. Complexity and character development are wonderful. I first read this 15 years ago. Just listened to it and the listen was fabulous.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Eight?

It's a complicated story with 2 plots woven together. You're in suspense till the very end.

What does Susan Denaker bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Would rather listen than read a hard copy.

Great story!

Enjoyed this very much! Good tempo. Great performance. The story was unlike any I've read.

Infinity a saga for a life time

What a saga of history and data analytics. If you love the da vinci saga you love this too.

Just too slow

I found the story line rather uninteresting. Lost interest and never finished. The story line just got too confusing. It was like you could tell there was a good read in there somewhere but it takes k especially a long time to find it.

loved listening to this one

I read the book and enjoyed it, but loved listening to the story. it's so full of cliffhangers I read it too quickly to be able to take it all in. I was able to enjoy the writing more with this audio book. I am not a huge fan of people reading English with accents when the characters are speaking another language, but I got so into the narration that it didn't bother me as much and I thought the narrator did a good job of distinguishing the characters through different voices. The transition between chapters was off and that made it hard to lose myself in the story, but I would still recommend this one.

Great premise. Could've used an editor

The storytelling could've used better pacing: towards the last third, it started to drag. And the storytelling could've used a bit of tightening up: as it is, the last few chapters had to carry the load of tying up the different strands with a lot of exposition vs unfolding. It's a shame. I did enjoy the story but it was a bit of a slog at the end.

The narrator was not too bad, able to manage the different languages passably.