The New Concise History of the Crusades- Revised Edition Description:

The New Concise History of the Crusades, Revised Edition review:
4 stars (Insight in medieval history) - The New Concise History shows a good view on the Medieval 'madness' in which thoudands and thousands of people wandered through Europe, disorganised, plundering and pillaging, without the organisational powers of the former Roman armies driven by religious fanatism. It also gives insight into the current situation of the Middle East. Once the christian knights of Europe were not far from the Jihad warriors of today...Wruthless, without compassion, murdering anyone that had not the Christian faith. Especially the Jews of Germany had to endur in the start of the Crusads....In so far af very good and readable book. The author does not use any difficult language, myself being from Holland, and it gives a very good oversight and insight into Europe around the year 1000...
5 stars (GOOD WORK TO GET YOU STARTED ) - As other reviewers have pointed out, there are pros and cons to this particular work. I have some reservations myself, but overall, found the work good. This work does indeed give us a good, if somewhat brief, overview of the crusades. The author does present some ideas that are a bit different than than those that have been traditionally taught, and for the most part, unquestioned. This, in my opinion is a good thing as it makes us all think. On the other hand, I am not enough of an expert to be able to verify with any validity some of his statements. I do feel the author tried to be fare. On the other hand he tells us "research" is able to give us much more insight as to what was in the hearts and minds of men and women several centuries ago. I find this hard to beleave at times. I also felt the author sort of fluffed over and flitted through some pretty important aspects of the crusades. The act of completely obliterating city after city and the killing of hundreds of innocent people, really deserves more than one or two sentences. All in all, the work is a good survey and I feel it's greatest value is to spur the reader to continue reading in this area and gather more information from writers, researchers and historians in the field. I gave this five stars due to the writing ability of the author and the sheer guts he shows here to go against common and popular opinion and because it caused me to rethink and exmine some of my long felt beliefs and notions. This is always a good thing. All in all, I highly recommend and recommend you add this one to your collection.
5 stars (The New Concise History of the Crusades, Revised Edition, by Thomas F. Madden) - In today's world -where complex historical events are pared down to sound-byte sized blurbs and widely propagated as the "truth" of one agenda or a collection of agendas, more works such as Thomas F. Madden's are increasingly needed -for the general populus (as well those of open mind in academia). This work, very well researched by an accomplished scholar, provides and excellent and accurate survey type account of the "Crusades" - which can be used an excellent snap-shot or as a guide to further study and more accurate understanding of what this portion of history really was about and its influence on today's world situation. Ideal for the average person who wants more understanding than can be found in "popular media" as well as those pursuing more dedicated scholarship on this subject. Highly recommended as a view, not as "popular" as today's PC world dictates, of how the events in the beginning of the 21st Century - are connected with those -unlearned history lessons - from 1000 years ago.