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milo_afc 's review for:
The Silk Roads: A New History of the World
by Peter Frankopan
I've heard many good things about Peter Frankopan's The Silk Roads: A New History of the World so it was interesting to properly get the chance to finally read it. I don't read much non-fiction except for when I'm studying, and now that I'm no longer a student it was interesting to read this and not take notes every other few page. What we got from Frankopan here is actually a really fascinating experience, as he offers what the title heading for the book calls "A New History of the World", giving an overview of key events in history, dictating the rise and fall of multiple empires, to the spread of various religions, right up to the modern era. It feels like too much content to put into one book and to go into any real depth, but Frankopan not only finds a way to do that, but also to make it readable and not boring.
That's the biggest problem that I had with most of the non-fiction books that I was reading as research for my dissertation, they struggled to hold my interest and were it not for the assignment I almost certainly wouldn't have bothered at all. But Frankopan's well-developed, largely unbiased take on world history offers it from an interesting perspective that's not often covered, exploring well-trodden ideas in a fairly new and interesting light, going into just the right amount of depth to flesh them out but also not overdoing them. When you consider how well respected Frankopan is as well as historian, it certainly serves to add credibility to his work, and the balance between an entertaining narrative and plenty of historical research is handled nicely.
This is a must read novel for anyone who reads non-fiction. I can't recommend it enough.
That's the biggest problem that I had with most of the non-fiction books that I was reading as research for my dissertation, they struggled to hold my interest and were it not for the assignment I almost certainly wouldn't have bothered at all. But Frankopan's well-developed, largely unbiased take on world history offers it from an interesting perspective that's not often covered, exploring well-trodden ideas in a fairly new and interesting light, going into just the right amount of depth to flesh them out but also not overdoing them. When you consider how well respected Frankopan is as well as historian, it certainly serves to add credibility to his work, and the balance between an entertaining narrative and plenty of historical research is handled nicely.
This is a must read novel for anyone who reads non-fiction. I can't recommend it enough.