Customer Reviews

The kings of vain intent

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The sequel to 'Knights of Dark Renown' would probably be an exciting enough read, provided you don't know anything of the real history and characters depicted. Unfortunately, if you do, it rapidly moves from the irritating to the downright offensive, especially with regard to Shelby's grotesque depiction of Conrad of Montferrat, here depicted as a vampiric-looking, twisted sadist who tortures his wife. (The US edition of the novel adds an extra chapter, not in the UK edition, to accommodate an explicit flogging and rape.) It's bad enough that the poor man was assassinated physically; Shelby's character-assassination of him (for which there is no historical evidence) is gratuitous sensationalism. As a long-term researcher of the character, it was obvious to me that Shelby hadn't read the detailed Italian or German works on him, and had just created a 2-D 'Wicked Sir Jasper' melodrama villain and stuck his name on to it. A pity, since the real man would have made a splendid dashing, tragic hero... Shelby's treatment of him is just a sickening travesty, and left me disgusted with the whole book, although I had enjoyed its predecessor well enough.

Character-assassination... in every sense, 1 Feb 2006

The sequel to 'Knights of Dark Renown' would probably be an exciting enough read, provided you don't know anything of the real history and characters depicted. Unfortunately, if you do, it rapidly moves from the irritating to the downright offensive, especially with regard to Shelby's grotesque depiction of Conrad of Montferrat, here depicted as a vampiric-looking, twisted sadist who tortures his wife. (The US edition of the novel adds an extra chapter, not in the UK edition, to accommodate an explicit flogging and rape.) It's bad enough that the poor man was assassinated physically; Shelby's character-assassination of him (for which there is no historical evidence) is gratuitous sensationalism. As a long-term researcher of the character, it was obvious to me that Shelby hadn't read the detailed Italian or German works on him, and had just created a 2-D 'Wicked Sir Jasper' melodrama villain and stuck his name on to it. A pity, since the real man would have made a splendid dashing, tragic hero... Shelby's treatment of him is just a sickening travesty, and left me disgusted with the whole book, although I had enjoyed its predecessor well enough.

This book takes up where the Knights of Dark Renown left off. Saladin has won his battles, and the Moslems now control Palestine. The Christian leaders are Saladin's prisoners, and their castles and the holy city of Jerusalem are in Saracan hands. But a new star is on the horizon, heading with steady implacability towards Palestine: Richard the Lion-Hearted. Will he be able to free Palestine from Moslem hands and return it to Christian control?

This lackluster offering follows the events of the Third Crusade, but unlike its predecessor, the characters are wooden, often one-dimensional portrays that could have been cut directly out of 10th-grade history texts and pasted onto these pages. Shelby appears to not know what to do with the newly-freed Christian leaders before Richard arrives, and once the Lion-Hearted appears all other personages fade into the background. Humphrey and Isabella suffer horribly throughout this entire book, yet the reader feels little connection or sympathy to them: somehow it all seems impossibly fake. By the end of the book one feels the worst of all feelings: relief.

Hard to believe that the two books were written by the same person. It took me years to find this sequel, and frankly, it wasn't worth the effort. Just get the Knights of Dark Renown and skip the follow up: you won't be missing anything you didn't know from history....

Character-assassination... in every sense, 1 Feb 2006

The sequel to 'Knights of Dark Renown' would probably be an exciting enough read, provided you don't know anything of the real history and characters depicted. Unfortunately, if you do, it rapidly moves from the irritating to the downright offensive, especially with regard to Shelby's grotesque depiction of Conrad of Montferrat, here depicted as a vampiric-looking, twisted sadist who tortures his wife. (The US edition of the novel adds an extra chapter, not in the UK edition, to accommodate an explicit flogging and rape.) It's bad enough that the poor man was assassinated physically; Shelby's character-assassination of him (for which there is no historical evidence) is gratuitous sensationalism. As a long-term researcher of the character, it was obvious to me that Shelby hadn't read the detailed Italian or German works on him, and had just created a 2-D 'Wicked Sir Jasper' melodrama villain and stuck his name on to it. A pity, since the real man would have made a splendid dashing, tragic hero... Shelby's treatment of him is just a sickening travesty, and left me disgusted with the whole book, although I had enjoyed its predecessor well enough.

This novel, set during the years 1187-92, centers on the Second Crusade to free the Holy Land from Muslim rule, of which Richard II Lionheart of England was a central character. Though he plays a major part in the book, its primary focus is Balian of Ibelin, Lord of Nablus (born, as so many participants in that Crusade were, in the European kingdoms of Outremer established after the victorious First Crusade), his wife Maria Comnena, her daughter Princess Isabella or Jerusalem (the younger daughter of the first Frankish king of that domain), Isabella's husband Humphrey, Lord of Toron, and Balian's squire Ernoul, a would-be poet and historian. In the wake of the Frankish defeat at Hattin, which led to his two-year imprisonment by the Muslims under Saladin, Guy of Lusignan, the reluctant current King of Jerusalem through his marriage to Isabella's older sister, finds himself embroiled in a rivalry with Conrad, Marquis of Montferrat, who has established himself as deliverer and lord of Tyre and is eager to hand it over to a European king--preferably Philip Augustus of France or the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa of Germany, who are both his cousins--and thereby consolidate his own position. But Conrad has other ambitions too, including the throne of Jerusalem. Since Guy has a powerful backer of his own--his family has sworn fealty to Richard--it looks as if only political maneuvering will secure it for him. But when Guy's queen dies unexpectedly, another route opens up. If Conrad can secure Isabella as his wife, he'll have a legitimate claim to the throne. That she is happily married matters not a whit to him.

What's most tragic about the unfolding story isn't the European loss of the conquests of almost 50 years earlier, but the fate of Isabella and the grief of her family. Conrad--a villain of the kind you love to hate--is so thoroughly slimy that you wish this were the era of King Arthur and some bold and valorous knight would offer to rescue the "damsel in distress." Unfortunately, even after Isabella is unexpectedly relieved of him, none does, and she remains a helpless pawn.

Shelby portrays the Second Crusade as not so much a military but a political effort, and succeeds in providing his readers with a comprehensible explanation of its failure, caused chiefly by the internecine squabbling among the Crusaders, who, while united by a common religion, all seemed more interested in advancing their personal programs. He also finds time to portray something of the character of Richard, accepting the modern scholarship which argues that he was homosexual and never consummated his marriage to Princess Berengaria of Navarre, and showing both good and bad aspects to this famous ruler who never really ruled England. Richard's great rival Saladin, too, has an important role and is sympathetically portrayed as a human being who was in many ways superior to those he fought. Though not as upbeat as many, this is a superior historical novel, well researched and tightly written. Readers who enjoy it should also seek out the author's The Knights of Dark Renown.