The sudden ambush of a Christian Caravan in twelfth century Palestine takes a young Frankish noble out of his world into the secret existence of a ruthless people called 'Assassins. These are the historical ancestors of Al Qaeda in far away Persia, ruled by the Master, the temporal and spiritual leader of the sect.Talon is taken deep into the sinister world of the Assassins high in their mountain castles He must become one of the best of the Fida'i or students of assassination in order to survive in this strange new culture which is fraught with dangers. He becomes one of them as they train him well in preparation for their deadly missions.Until the discovery of a plot to kill the Master forces him and a young princess to find a way to escape in order to reach her brother and warn him of the danger.
James Boschert grew up in the then colony of Malaya between the ages of four and eleven. The Chinese communists were active in the jungles at the time threatening the entire country with a cruel insurgency. His school was burned down and the family survived the ambush of a food convoy, saved by a patrol of Gurkha soldiers. He joined the British army as a boy soldier and later served in remote places like Borneo, Oman and other countries of the Middle East, eventually spending several years in Iran. While there he explored the castles of the infamous sect known as the Ismaili or Hashashini. It sometimes took a few days hard walking or driving to find these remote deserted fortresses high in the mountains of the Alborz in northern Iran. They eventually became the subject matter for his first book "The Assassins of Alamut" Escaping from the turmoil of Iran during the revolution he went to college and now lives in the USA.
"One of my lifelong passions has been horses which have richly rewarded my life. I enjoyed hunter jumping and dressage competitions. However some fool gave me a polo mallet once so all that went out of the window and I was hooked on that crazy game. I played polo in Malaysia,Cyprus,Iran and in the USA."
He has developed a fascination for medieval history in general but in particular the history of the Middle East, Andalusia,Egypt and all the way to India. His books are historical novels about the medieval history of the same region but seen from both perspectives, that of the Crusaders and the Moslem world. "I believe that in order to put some depth to the Crusades one needs to look at what was going on all around them at the same time. I find the world at that time incredibly rich in every aspect."
" The four legs of civilization as we have recorded it, Andalusia, Europe, Byzantium and the old empires of Persia and the Islamic world of Syria and Egypt make a rich backdrop for any novel."
The politics and under currents of the Middle East continue to hold my attention as they are always in flux and are never still."
