Brethren: An Epic Adventure of the Knights Templar (published in 2006) - Historical fiction, authored by Robyn Young

The time of the Crusades were a fascinating period for history buffs and historians, because of the sheer changes that happened in the Holy Land during the time period of the Crusades. Getting control of the Holy Lands in the Middle East was decreed as a holy duty, and participating in this holy duty was seen important for most European rulers and noblemen. Getting control of the holiest city of Jerusalem was the top mission, but it was not just this city. The area around the city and numerous strategic points had to be controlled as well; on the other side were some elements of the Mongols and more important, there were the Egyptians who saw the Holy Land as their territory and saw it as their holy duty to rid the land of these Christian invaders who were coming in from Europe and trying to set foot in their territory.
During these periods, there were some very impressive warriors who were involved in the crusades and the fight by the Egyptians, with names such as Richard the Lionheart, Saladin, and others. Among the others were the Marmaluk dynasty from Egypt, with many of their Sultans seeing it as their duty to follow in the footsteps of Saladin and remove these foreign fighters from these lands. And in the midst of all this were the people of these cities, forts and of the overall area, who wanted to make a living and were forever in danger. For anybody who has done some amount of historical readings, the Crusades were a very bloody time period. Overall, war itself involved huge casualties, and not only of the soldiers, but also of the citizens who were in grave danger of being killed, or at the minimum, looted or sent into slavery. But these battles during the Crusades had religious sanction for the blood-letting, and it was not uncommon for a victorious army to kill not only the opposing army but even all citizens of the conquered city.




This book is set in such a time period. It takes some real historical characters, and some fictional, tracking their lives during a specific period of the Crusades. And of course, it also makes extensive use of a historical society, the Knights Templar, who became incredibly powerful and were answerable only to the pope. On the one side, you have a young boy, William Campbell, who has been admitted to the Knights as a young sergeant, hoping to become a Knight here. His father is already in the Holy Lands along with the Knights. On the other side is the young slave, Baybars, who became a commander to the various Sultans; he was extremely ambitious and when the Sultan would not give him what he wanted, he was ready to get rid of the Sultan and finally take the power to himself.
And in the middle of all this is a book. This is where the story takes a meander, since the Book is about an inner council of the Knights Templar, and in a land where the very sniff of heresy could get you burnt at the stake, the Book talks in terms of a Grail Romance, and could very easily be used by a rival to destroy the Knights. And along with their power, the Knights had a number of enemies, since royal dynasties typically did not like power centers in their kingdom that reported only to the Pope (and also, the Knights would have lent money to the King and were not above demanding their money, acting as an equal to the King). So, there are multiple people hunting for this book, including the future king of England (Edward, known in history as Edward Longshanks) and the action slowly moves to the Holy Land where Baybars is being ruthless in his desire to rid the whole place of the corrupting influence of the Franks, and vows to defeat all the Crusaders.
The book is well researched and moves between the different characters, taking a short time period of history that was clearly significant (the rise and rule of Baybars was significant). The book also does not shirk from showing the brutality of war, although it does tend to depict Baybars as ruthless and cruel, while he is seen as a hero in the entire Middle East. And of course, the Crusaders were equally likely to be ruthless and murdering entire cities when they took them. Somehow, the end is a bit of a let down since the story becomes flat near the end. The end is an interesting anti-climax situation, but overall, the book was interesting.

Red Storm Rising (published in 1986) - Authored by Tom Clancy, a conflict between NATO and Warsaw

Tom Clancy (1947 - 2013) was an author who wrote a number of gripping novels taking the intelligence agencies and military and wrote novels around these, involving a number of different countries. In some cases, the level of details was such that it surprised even experts. For example, when his first novel, 'The Hunt for Red October' came out in 1984, it was a big hit and the details of nuclear submarines was a surprise to everyone (with one person even wondering how the Government allowed a novel with such details to be published). Over a period of time, his novels, which initially focused on confrontation with the Soviets at an intelligence and military level, moved to new challenges, including reconciliation and support with the Russians and conflict with the Chinese (somewhat warped, and maybe even racist to some level - The Bear and the Dragon), and with more and more focus to conflict with Islamic terrorism (and the haunting depiction of the crashing of a full size commercial jet into the US Congress in the year 1994 - many years before the terrorist strike of 2001). For his fans, his novels were well researched novels, with a lot of details about how the intelligence agencies of the US Government worked, particularly through one of his chief characters - the honest and moral, and conservative Jack Ryan. For the generation who have been born after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, a novel about a clash between the huge Warsaw Pact and NATO forces in Europe would seem so old word, but this novel is a fascinating reading about how the policy making works in a restricted government - where the leaders think that whatever they say will happen. And the details of the military action are also great. Of course, most of Clancy's novels are gripping, but they are thick and take their own time to read (and read with great care).



Red Storm Rising does not have any association with Jack Ryan, one of the few of Clancy's novels that do not have any association with his chief character. It starts out with a terrorist strike by independence seekers from Azerbaijan who destroy a huge oil production facility, with this single striking causing a massive blow to the ability of the Soviet Union to generate oil - and this affects their production facilities, their farm production and their military. One option is to get cooperation from the West and seek their help - but internal politics plays a key role in moving the politburo away from this option and instead launching an all out attack on the NATO forces across Europe so as to prevent them from mobilizing in support of a Soviet drive to attack across Iran and seize the Persian oil field. The concept being to somehow show that there was an attack on the Warsaw Pact and this would force the Soviet Union to retaliate and hold NATO in Europe and keep them busy. And why would this work ? The Warsaw Pact had a much larger number of tanks and military equipment than NATO, but the quality of forces is a different matter.
However, NATO learns of these plans and on the first day of the offensive, manage to get their superior aircraft to slow down the Russian advance by destroying enemy aircraft and key infrastructure such as bridges. Soviet planners expected a slow advance through Germany and were willing to take losses, but were also able to surprise their NATO opposites through seizing Iceland, and also using some tactical efforts to attack some NATO naval vessels.
However, things start to reverse with the grounding of the force based at Iceland and re-taking of Iceland by the US Marines. And then a quick attack places NATO forces behind the front of the Soviet army and then the forces also learn knowledge about the dire fuel status of the Soviet armies and they destroy some of their fuel supplies, in a prelude to the general attack against the Soviet army forces. But such an offensive might force the Russians to go nuclear. What happens next ?