Roads of Power

The Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan
New York : Vintage Books, 2017.
xix, 647 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : colored illustrations ; 24 cm.

This is a well-written enjoyable read that sets out to re-establish the historical roots of civilization further east than is common in the "western" canon.  Instead of placing the thread of history as Greece, Rome, Europe, and US-Europe, Frankopan adjusts the narrative to give prominence that part of the world between the eastern Mediterranean and China/India.

In telling the story he conveys how much vibrant politics, culture and trade was occurring in Central Asia both before Greece and Rome came on the scene and during the so called "Dark Ages" too.  There were some interesting parts of the history that I was not familiar with, especially the in roads into Central Asia made by the Vikings as they brought both pillage and trade down the Volga and trafficked heavily in slaves.

The narrative comes fully into the present with the vital role in recent politics that countries like Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India have played and continue to play and the powerful role that the Silk Roads area has played in the era of oil and gas beginning just before WWII and continuing to this day.

The book is a bit of a doorstop for high school readers, but I would recommend it to students needing source material for reports and to any avid history buffs.

The 911 That Never Should Have Been

The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 by Lawrence Wright
New York : Vintage Books, 2007.
540 p. : ill., maps ; 21 cm.

I've read a lot about the Middle East, and about 9/11, but The Looming Tower is one of the best books to pull all the narrative threads together into an informative, compelling and stunning read.

There were several things I learned that surprised me.  I didn't realize how central the Egyptian fundamentalist-jihad movement was to al-Qaeda.  I had no idea that Bin Laden's time in Sudan was marked by his arriving a multimillionaire and leaving virtually broke.  I didn't know that when he left Sudan for Afghanistan, he had no idea who the Taliban were and they were cautious about him, too.  Probably the most painful revelations of the book are the several times that the CIA refused to share information with the FBI which almost surely would have lead to the uncovering and thwarting of the 9/11 plot.  There is more to discover in Wright's definitive history.

I would definitely recommend this book to a student with a keen interest in the background of 9/11 or to a student working on a research project about 9/11.  It is a fine book, one which won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction.      

A Clash of Expectations

The Crusades: a Beginner's Guide by Andrew Jotischky
London : Oneworld, 2015.
xi, 180 pages : illustrations ; 20 cm    

I guess it's just really, really hard to write a short and memorable introduction to a subject as sprawling and complex as the Crusades.  It might be like asking someone to write a short introduction to contact between Europeans and American Indians - the first 200 years.  There's just so much time and geography to cover, and so many important figures to include.  I liked reading The Crusades by Jotischky, but after finishing it, I retained the broadest outlines of the history.

Perhaps that is the best a lay reader can hope for.  Jotischky does a fine job of laying out the major events of the Crusades which spanned the period of 1095 to about 1291.  He also provides some of the major forces underlying the Crusades (the complex web of papal, nobility, state and royal power, the role of religious belief, the cultural differences of both allies and enemies, etc.).  It is an interesting period for certain, but I'm afraid it's just too much for one short book.

I would recommend this book to a student who is already interested in the Crusades, or one who is researching the Crusades, but I would hesitate giving it to a student who is just interested in a non-fiction work of history.