In little more than 200 pages, in crystal-clear and economical prose, Madden does a superb job of exposition. As an introduction to the vast literature of the crusades, this is a jewel of a book. It has all one needs to understand the epic nature of the various mobilizations and invasions, who the important players were and how they operated, and why what was for centuries romanticized as chivalrous has today become odious. (James Reston Jr. Washington Post Book World)
Much praise is due to the author for giving us such a clear, concise picture of an ever-changing area of scholarship. (Patrick J. Holt H-Net Reviews)
Professor Madden has written a strong narrative of the crusades, focusing on the crusades to the East and on the major (or numbered) crusades. (James Powell)
Readers will be pleased that Thomas Madden has hit just the right note in his sweeping but concise account of the crusades. While he follows the development of crusading down to the period of the Protestant Reformation, and offers, in an afterword, speculations about the modern impact of the medieval crusade, he never fails to interest and inform. His prose is lucid. And to give the graphic point, he offers the reader fourteen clearly produced maps depicting the Mediterranean world about A.D. 1000, the routes of the main crusades, and the crusade plan of Maximilian I in 1518. The usefulness of these is reinforced by an index, a glossary, mainly of Islamic terms, a list of translated sources, and a select bibliography. (The Catholic Historical Review)
A gripping narrative approach of the medieval social, economic, religious, and intellectual environments that gave birth to the Crusades and nurtured them for centuries. (Missiology: An International Review)
This is a wonderful piece of work that will greatly add to the sum of crusade historiography. . . . It is brilliantly executed. . . . Madden's ability as a writer of gripping narrative shines through. This is a work that students will love, largely because it does not read like a textbook. (Alfred Andrea)
Readers will owe Thomas Madden warm thanks for so clear an introductory account of so complex a phenomenon as a crusade. (The Historian)
A brilliant text and handbook for students, teachers and all readers taking interest in the history of the Crusades. (Byzantische Zeitschrift)
It is clear handling of a complex subject that lets the facts speak for themselves. The book, moreover, lives up to its title. It is concise, but not overly simplified. It would serve as a fine text for undergraduate history students. (New Oxford Review)
Lucid, interesting, and lively. It certainly deserves to be listed in the bibliography for all undergraduate and school courses on the Crusades. (Islam And Christian-Muslim Relations)
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