September 17, 2007
This second entry in Whyte's Templar trilogy (after Knights of the Black and White
), covering Richard the Lionhearted's crusade, finds the author in top form. Alexander Sinclair, a Knight of the Temple, is part of a 50,000-man army headed to battle in the Lower Galilee. At stake for the Christian army is its claim to the Holy Land, now under the jurisdiction of Kurdish Saracen leader Saladin. The coming disaster will force English King Richard to raise an even larger army and set sail from England himself, along with Henry St. Clair, the English army's master-at-arms, and Henry's son, Andre, a member of the secret Templar society, Brotherhood of Sion. Whyte gilds the tangled political complications of the late 12th century with a rich trove of Templar lore—a treat for some readers, but superfluous for the more action oriented. And action is the point here: few authors can match Whyte when it comes to epic battle scenes involving blazing heat, choking dust, rearing horses and thousands of sword-wielding knights and Saracens locked in mortal combat.