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4.0 out of 5 stars
An Intelligent Piece of Historical Fiction, Mar 31 2002
At the outset I want to say that, while I liked it, I was also somewhat disappointed by this book since its first half was ponderous in pace and its characters rather two-dimensional. Francisco, the Crusading protagonist, seemed to me too infused with a twentieth century sensibility to ring true (as was his buddy Andres and Andres' sister, the lovely and apparently quite liberated Isabel), while Brother Lucas, the exorcist of record, seemed too silly and venal to have been really effective. However, I did like the subtle presentation of modern psychological theory in a medieval context of devils and demons and possession and the story really did pick up for me in the second half when Francisco and Andres find themselves in the midst of their long-sought Crusade.Never mind that their motivations in getting there feel more like those of some young moderns choosing to enlist in a Vietnam-like conflict or that their reactions to what they finally see in the Holy Land are more reminiscent of our modern distaste for war's excesses than reflective of what people of that time might really have said or felt. In fact, too much of their combined reactions seemed out-of-century to me, particularly when, witnessing an obvious war-crime (the rape and slaughter of women and children and the eating of the bodies of some of the slain), Francisco is moved to liken his compatriots to a "tribe of cannibals". Of course the Europeans didn't fully become aware of such "tribes" until centuries later when they encountered these in the South Seas, in the Americas and in Africa, so this image appears quite out of place. Later when the loveable and honorable Crusader, Uncle Ramon, tells his nominal superior that what has occurred "was incompatible with our mission", one hears echoes of My Lai, making for further historical dissonance. Both Francisco and Andres are, of course, mortified at the excesses of their brethren and soon disillusioned by the miseries of medieval warfare. Still, the later part of the book, in which they find their moral bearings and sensitivities, is extremely well-done and stands out for its clarity of focus and excellent pacing, more than making up for the slowness that went before. As the tale picks up steam in its second half, one really has a feeling of being there and the book becomes hard to lay aside. By the time our heroes are in Baibars' prison I was completely hooked as the underlying cause of Francisco's "possession" became clear, lending real tension to how the tale, told in flashback, would work itself out in the "real time" of Brother Lukas' exorcism. (I did, by the way, like the final, swashbuckling sword fight, which was very nicely handled, though I wondered what happened to Brother Vial and felt let down by the fight's ultimate outcome as given in the epilogue.) A word about technique: I have seen quite a few books done with unreliable narrators and with competing perspectives, just like this one, so this is not new in Mr. Eisner's work. Still he handled it better than some I have read although I thought his decision to go this route unnecessarily and almost self-consciously precocious as it did not, in my opinion, add significantly to the telling of his tale. But, on balance, I liked this book (since I read it through in a single day and it takes a lot, these days, to get me to do that). But I thought it could have been richer if his characterizations had had more "flesh" to them and he'd avoided the discordances of anachronistic perspectives. Worth four stars, I think, for its crisp narration (second half only) and its intelligent vision of a benighted time -- but just barely. SWM
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