What is the author's style in Russka: The Novel of Russia by Edward Rutherfurd?

Russka, by Edward Rutherford, is written in the third person point of view with the narrator being the author. This perspective allows the author to provide all of the details and background information that the reader needs to understand the novel. In a novel of this kind, the book covers eighteen hundred years of generations, history, religion and culture. The author could have written in the first person point of view with the main character of each section being the narrator, but this would have confined the knowledge of the reader to the knowledge of the main character and would have been severely restricting. The book would not be as rich in content and detail as it is.