Rating: 
Summary: History, but not of the Templars
Review: A very well written and well researched book....about the Crusades in general. As others have mentioned, this book barely talks about the Templars but puts them as anecdotes to the history of the crusades in general. This is probably a good book to start with if you know nothing of the crusades or the Templars since it gives a good overall background. For anyone who wants in depth information about the order, try a different book.
Rating:
Summary: A poorly written book
Review: This is not a good book. I have read many books about Medieval history and the Crusades, but I had to struggle to finish this one. It is confusing, poorly written, superficial, illogical, and sometimes even plain wrong in its historical conclusions.It is a long list of meaningless names, dates, countries, with very little insight or background. It jumps back and forth in time and space with not much logic and it is very confusing. It presents characters and events at random, then abandons them, and eventually they come back but without any continuity or chronological coherence. The Templars are not even mentioned for about 1/3 of the book, then they make a few token appearances, but there is no insight into the Order. The last two chapters finally concentrate a bit more on the Templars' fall, but the conclusive chapters is such a cocktail of weird opinions that it left a sour taste in my mouth. VERY disappointing, in fact I returned the book, I don't want it in my library...
Rating: 
Summary: a serious, profound work on the Templars
Review: I enjoyed this book that is deep in details on the political intriques of the period that saw the rise of the Knights Templar and ultimately lead to their destruction. However, I recommend this to only serious minded people in pursuit of knowledge on the templars. This is heavy reading for the general 'wee guide to' knowledge seekers and will likely bore them. But to the people wanting a better understanding of their order, the climate that saw them move from a religious order to one of the biggest bankers concerns in the Middle Ages that controlled Kings and Nations, this book delivers. For those seeking more than the superficial, then this book is it.
Rating: 
Summary: More questions than answers
Review: This is a sound piece of work. The best sections of this book are those concerning the downfall of the order. I came away from this wondering many more things about the Knights and their rise to prominence than I would have liked. More information of a political or military nature pertaining to their rise as a temporal force would make this book a great read.
As it stands, it's average.
Rating:
Summary: A Well-Written History of the Templars
Review: The Templars, but Piers Paul Read, is a pretty thorough history of the famous order. It's precise, well written and packed with information. I appreciated the wealth of information and detail in this book. Moreover, for all its detail, it was readable (if thick, at times) and interesting, representing an admirable academic coverage of the topic. But, the book itself may not be what you had in mind? The reader might be discouraged to find that it starts a little slowly. Read feels required to provide a substantial (about 90 page!) background of the political and religious history of the Holy Land, apparently to ensure that the reader has the proper backdrop for the history of the Templars. While I found that section interesting and informative, it did dampen my enthusiasm a little. And if when you think of the Templars, images of rows of mounted knights, pennants flapping in a brisk breeze, horses with the bit in their mouth and the clash of steel spring to your mind, you're headed in the wrong direction by picking up this book. You won't find any imagery, and little storytelling, here. The historical figures do not come alive as if there were characters in a novel. If that's what you're after, look elsewhere. What you will get is a good historical reference on the topic, and a thorough coverage of names, dates and places. You'll understand the who, what, where, when, and usually, why. But you won't be swept away by it. On the whole, the book is quite good, and reads well (if slowly). I recommend it, with the caveat that the prospective buyer/reader should be aware what he or she starting.
Rating: 
Summary: A Good Starting Point
Review: I picked this book up because I had heard wild rumors about the Templars and their involvement in occultic practices. This book will not shed any light on those rumors, but if you are serious about study and not merely interested in a 13th century X-File story, this is a useful book. It deals less with the intimacies of Templar life than it does with the political and cultural forces which underlined the times of the Crusades. What you will get from this book is a foundation from which to launch further study of the Templar Order and a reliable reference to come back to as your studies progress.
Rating:
Summary: A MUST for crusade fanatics
Review: To me, the Templars were one of those landmark groups in history that so many people dare not hear or even think of. Spotting this book was a blessing for me, because Reed doesn't just give a history of the Templars, but a history of the world...from the beginning. He goes all the way back to Abraham, then to David and Solomon, to the building of the temple, to Christ, and so forth until he reaches Mohammed and the imminent reign of Islam, and then the crusades. I do agree that he tends to focus more on the Crusades, but being one of the few biographies of the Templars, I think he explains his point well, their rise to fame, riches and glory to their fall, and endings for some of them at the stake. Overall, I loved this book. It was hard to put down, and gives not only the history of the Templars, but all world history leading up to the Templars. A must for crusade fanatics, however a bit drier in the Templar region than I expected it to be.
Rating:
Summary: Tedious and Boring -- This Could Be a College Textbook
Review: Or, perhaps, it should be renamed "A History of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, with Special Reference to the Crusades." The author tells us that this book was written to answer questions about the Templars, a legendary but shadowy group about which even the generally better-informed person of today probably knows very little. As a force in the Holy Land and Europe they lasted for only two centuries, from about 1100 to 1300. The author, however, in order to set the scene for them, first gives us approximately 2000 years of excruciatingly boring history about the development of the three main religions that have fought over the Holy Land for so many years and how the Templars were an outgrowth of this endless conflict. For page after page, name after name after name is invoked, battles are fought, spheres of influence come and go, Popes are named -- and then we get *another* 50 pages of the same stuff. And still no Templars. Eventually the Templars are introduced -- but hardly play a major role in the *next* 200 pages or so. More names, more battles, more Popes, plus, of course, various Crusades. Finally, in the last 40 pages or so of the book, we have the destruction of the Templars at the hands of King Philip of France and the Church. Here the focus is finally put upon the Templars themselves, but even so in a curiously lifeless manner. This is a dry, dull book that may well have been intended to be an overall history of this period until an editor took the author aside and told him that it would never be published unless he found some sort of theme to hook the narrative to so that it might interest the general reader -- with the result that the Templars were given an added emphasis. I could be wrong about this, but I find it curious that an author who has apparently published a dozen novels could write such a lifeless, tedious book. It's as if he had researched this period thoroughly, put names and dates onto 10,000 3-by-5 cards the way we were taught to do in high school, and then worked like crazy to get every single bit of information from his research into the text of his book. About the only virtues I can find in this book are that he does write a clean, serviceable prose. And that he appears to be very even-handed, even excruciatingly fair, to all the religious points of view. He is, however, unable to get the reader interested in the broad picture of what is happening as he gets hopelessly bogged down in the details. One minor example: at the very start of the book he gives us a detailed account of Mohammet's early days and his creation of Islam. And yet he never tells us what "Islam" actually means. Do you know? Go look it up for yourselves....
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Summary: CRUSADING KNIGHTS BURNED AT THE STAKE
Review: The Knights of the Temple of Solomon were a religious, military order of warrior monks dedicated to reclaiming the Holy Lands for Christendom. Piers Paul Read chronicles the rise and fall of the Templars from the order's inception on Chritmas Day, 1119, to their erradication by the Inquisition in 1314 with the burning at the stake of their last Grand Master James of Molay. "The Templars" is a fascinating study of faith, conflict, greed and the quest for power. It examines the conflict between Christians and Muslims, between the Church of Rome and the Eastern Church, between Popes and Kings and between competing orders and individuals for personal power and wealth and for the greater glory of God. The Knights who wore the red cross on their tunics during the Crusades became the richest land owners in Medeaval Europe, the most skilled administrators, devoted monks and skilled warriors among their contemporaries and yet proved no match for the Machiavellian politics that swirled around them. In the end their faithful service and great success evoked envy and fear and doomed them to lose all them possessions, honored status and, in many instances, their lives. The Templars extraordinary 200-year history led to many later claims of successor status (masons) and a host of conspiracy theories. Read's excellent narrative history is interesting and informative and provides a very readable introduction to this historical period as well as being the definitive work about The Knights of the Temple of Solomon.
Rating: 
Summary: Papal Bull
Review: Centuries of lies have have come back to haunt Her. The truth has taken a huge toll. I wonder if this book is not a part of the current push by the Church to repair Her tarnished reputation. The Church is still reeling from losing the war against the Galileo/Copernicus front and apparantly having surrendered Her onslaught against Darwin (and Morris.) Now it seems She has retreated and is licking Her wounds; reorganizing Her plan of attack and trying to put a dignified face on a shameful history. Her public relations experts are busy, busy, busy REwriting away.
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