On Unity and Morale with Charles Martel

On Unity and Morale with Charles Martel

The Path of the Martyrs: Charles Martel, The Battle of Tours, and the Birth of Europe by Ed West. Sharpe Books, 2019. Paperback and Kindle, 108 pages, $6. Reviewed by Matthew M. Robare In October of 732 a Muslim army composed mostly of light cavalry headed north to...
Things Strange and Admirable

Things Strange and Admirable

Laughing Shall I Die: Lives and Deaths of the Great Vikings by Tom Shippey. Reaktion Books, 2018. Hardcover, 368 pages, $30. Reviewed by Timothy D. Lusch It is a mark of our Age of Sensitivity that scholars have tried to turn the murderous Vikings into hygge-loving...
That Old-Time Civil Religion

That Old-Time Civil Religion

The Tragedy of U.S. Foreign Policy: How America’s Civil Religion Betrayed the National Interest by Walter A. McDougall. Yale University Press, 2016. Hardcover, 424 pages, $30. Reviewed by Richard M. Gamble Walter McDougall begins his sober analysis of civil religion...
Sufism as Civil Religion?

Sufism as Civil Religion?

Caliphate Redefined: The Mystical Turn in Ottoman Political Thought by Hüseyin Yilmaz. Princeton University Press, 2018. Hardcover, 384 pages, $40. Reviewed by Fitzroy Morrissey In his very useful pocket-guide The Caliphate: A Pelican Introduction (2016), the...
The Center Holds

The Center Holds

The Midwestern Moment: The Forgotten World of Early Twentieth Century Midwestern Regionalism, 1880–1940 Edited by Jon K. Lauck. Hastings College Press, 2017. Hardcover, 306 pages, $40. Reviewed by Nicole M. King “The Corn Belt,” “America’s Breadbasket,” “The...