Charles Martel & the Battle of Tours: the Defeat of the Arab Invasion of Western Europe by the Franks, 732 A.D

This book should probably be called something more along the lines of "All about the people and the events leading up to the Battle of Tours." It's chuck full of people (Muslims and Franks) and places. So many, in fact, that they are really hard to keep track of. The book really could use a lot more "illustrations" - of Europe, of the locations of the respective Frankish and German tribes, along with maybe some family trees for everyone involved (Franks and Muslims). What you get here is quite a bit of a history lesson on all of the events in both the Frankish and Muslim worlds leading up to the Battle of Tours - hundreds of years of people, places and tribes. And then you get maybe a page or two about the actual battle. And then some post-Battle of Tours information leading up to Charles Martel's grandson, the Great Charlemagne. Overall, it's a slog and suffers from a lack of organization. Couldn't finish it. Thumbed through the contents after the Battle of Tours, looking for any illustrations that might aid the written word. None to be found.

Short book, basically tells the same story several times from different writers. Reads like several semi-academic papers thrown together. Zero stars! Highly disappointing. I could have bought a real book from a real historian for what I paid for this trash. If you are interested in this subject buy, literally, ANY OTHER BOOK.

A little slow in the beginning but a good read.

These was a lot of interesting detail in this book and the brutal shenanigans of this period of history was eye opening and informative.