James Reston Jr.'s Warriors of God is a brisk read recounting the events leading up to and concluding the Third Crusade, focusing in particular on its two lead protagonists as framed by the book: Saladin and Richard the Lionheart. While the book moves along at a brisk pace, there are times the popular history aspect allows novelistic and dramatic elements, even those drawn from source documents, to overpower the history, which can bog down the flow and become a bit of a distraction.
Reston Jr. does a great job of outlining the Third Crusade's main figures as well as their motivations and internal conflicts, particularly on the side of the Crusaders, who don't come across very well in comparison to Saladin. Richard himself, however, is a rather stunning figure who comes across much larger than life than I remember in my Ancient England class in college, though I'd have to wager this is because my class was academic and peeled back the myth while Reston Jr. happily recounts the exaggerated descriptions contained in the writings of the period, preferring the rollicking fun of the yarn to the analytical deconstruction, which is an understandable choice.
Whether intentionally or not, and while there certainly are moments where both sides exchange being in the wrong, Saladin and his army come across much better than the squabbling, weird, trailer park energy brought to the scene by the Crusaders. The entire saga of Richard's betrothal to Alais is a great encapsulation: per the book, Richard the Lionheart and Philip II of France are lovers. Nothing wrong with that, except that Richard's father is sleeping with his lover's half-sister—and after knocking her up, he wants the young gay couple to split up for his son to marry his mistress (and presumably raise his bastard half-brother as a son).
This is one of the most famous monarchs in English history, remember, not a recounting of an episode of Jerry Springer. Throw in a paternity test for that kid and you've got some overlap appeal with a Maury paternity test, even, make it a real greatest trash TV hits of history. Richard was also gay, per Reston Jr. and as already mentioned, which is an interesting aside—maybe if he and Saladin had hit it off, we could have had a much more peaceful resolution to the Third Crusade, but the pair were batting for different teams in more than one way. It doesn't help things that in the case of the Crusades, the Christians were the belligerents.
Saladin, on the flip side, comes across as an educated, informed, and merciful warrior—a stark contrast to Richard and his scorched earth approach. Unfortunately, he also seems to be so much Richard's contrast that it reflects a certain amount of naïveté: one easy example being sending Richard a horse with his compliments after seeing the opposing king's ferocity in battle. Now, I'm not a commanding officer, but I do generally find it a good idea not to give my enemy, who might be about to fail, a convenient escape. This is real life, not Batman letting the Joker go for the umpteenth time.
Regardless, at the end of the day, as well-researched as the book is (and there's no doubt that Reston Jr. must have spent a lot of time buried in primary source documents doing his research), I do think that there's a pronounced bias in favor of European sources. This is totally understandable as I, too, am more familiar with European sources. That having been said, if anyone remembers my review of The Gardens of Light: I have a bit of an author crush on Amin Maalouf, who has written the non-fiction The Crusades Through Arab Eyes, so there's a great source I'll be adding to the to-read list.
As a final aside: one lingering question for me does remain for the derivation of the word 'assassin.' As recounted here and in a few other sources, it is often tied to the word 'hashish,' and it is believed assassins acted as recounted in this book: getting really fucking high and getting their orders in this daze, with the high meant to be a sort of 'taste' of the bliss of heaven. However, in Samarkand, Maalouf addresses this claim and instead traces the origin of the word to (I believe) an Arabic word meaning 'cornerstone' and reflecting the Old Man of the Mountain's belief that his secret society worked as a sort of cornerstone for Islam. Given Maalouf's tendency to be pretty accurate with his facts, even in fiction, this makes me wonder which explanation is correct and whether there has been something lost in translation—or whether this was just an example of artistic liberty.
This all aside, Warriors of God is an enjoyable, brisk read and coming in at only a few hundred pages about a lesser-known period of history, why not?
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