1.0 out of 5 stars
Not what I thought it would be, Mar 24 2010
This review is from: Templar Trilogy #2: Standard of Honor (Mass Market Paperback)
I have enjoyed Whyte's previous Arthurian novels, and so picked this one up.
I was disappointed to find that it is not really about the crusades or the Knights Templar, but about a secret society called the Order of Sion, who claim to be protecting some not quite specified truth about the origins of Christianity.
Perhaps the grossest failing of this book is the author's inabitily get beyond contemporary biases and to imagine that a decent person in the middle ages might have actually believed sincerely in the organized religions of Christianity, Islam, or Judaism. Instead, all the major characters are prone to diatribes denouncing all organized religion and scoffing at anyone associated with it. It made them seem less like individual people and more like mouthpieces for the author. Also, I have little sympathy for members of a secret society who withhold a supposed truth from others on purpose, then not only look down on those others, but manipulate their lives and send them to war, even to their deaths, in order to achieve their own goals.
As for a story about a secret society that holds some "new" truth about the origins of Christianity, well, Dan Brown already wrote that book.
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4.0 out of 5 stars
From One - leading you to Two, wanting Three, Feb 3 2010
This review is from: Templar Trilogy #2: Standard of Honor (Mass Market Paperback)
Well, Mr. Whyte captured my attention in the first book. He does an exceptional job in this second, leading the reader to want to purchase and read the final version. Like book one, he leads us through a progressive state with the Knights Templar. Again, keep in mind he has blended factual events in history to fictional characters - and a fine job. Another page-turner.
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