Swords from the West

by Harold Lamb, Robert Weinberg (Introduction), Howard Andrew Jones (Editor)

Beset by enemies on every side and torn by internal divisions, the crusader kingdoms were a hotbed of intrigue, where your greatest ally might be your natural enemy. Because lives and kingdoms often rested on the edge of a sword blade, it was a time when a bold heart and a steady hand would see you far—so long as you watched your back.

 

Here, for the first time, are all seventeen of Harold Lamb’s uncollected crusader stories in one volume. Read now of the fall of kingdoms and the fate of doomed men, of desperate battles and brave comrades, of shrewd maids and scheming nobles. Join Nial O’Gordon, a young crusader riding deep into Asia to forget his past. Venture forth with Sir Robert of Antioch to cross blades with the Mongol hordes. Join King Richard the Lionhearted for his last battle. Stand firm beside Sir John and his Arab friend Khalil against a band of traitors. And sail out with Michael Bearn on a mission of vengeance, as he risks his life to bring down a sultan and his kingdom.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Adventure, Fiction, Anthologies, Fantasy, Pulp

622 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2009

About the author

Harold Albert Lamb was an American historian, screenwriter, short story writer, and novelist.

Born in Alpine, New Jersey, he attended Columbia University, where his interest in the peoples and history of Asia began. Lamb built a career with his writing from an early age. He got his start in the pulp magazines, quickly moving to the prestigious Adventure magazine, his primary fiction outlet for nineteen years. In 1927 he wrote a biography of Genghis Khan, and following on its success turned more and more to the writing of non-fiction, penning numerous biographies and popular history books until his death in 1962. The success of Lamb's two volume history of the Crusades led to his discovery by Cecil B. DeMille, who employed Lamb as a technical advisor on a related movie, The Crusades, and used him as a screenwriter on many other DeMille movies thereafter. Lamb spoke French, Latin, Persian, and Arabic, and, by his own account, a smattering of Manchu-Tartar.

From Wikipedia

Reviews

[Dfordoom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Swords from the West is more than just a collection of short stories. The seventeen stories in this volume include two short novels and several other stories that are virtually novellas.

New Jersey-born Harold Lamb (1892-1962) was one of the grand masters of the adventure story. He wrote for pulp magazines but also wrote a number of serious historical works as well as penning the screenplay for Cecil B. DeMille’s underrated 1935 epic The Crusades Lamb was fluent in French, Latin, Arabic and Persian with a smattering of other eastern languages as well and can be considered to be one of the most erudite of adventure writers.

Swords from the West claims to be a collection of his tales about the Crusades but the stories are far more more varied than that would suggest, including a story of the Battle of Châlons in 451 (possibly the most decisive battle in European history, the battle that ended the advance of Attila’s Huns into Europe and also the last great Roman victory). There’s even a ghost story set in India during the Raj.

Lamb was renowned for his even-handedness. There are Crusader heroes but there are brave and honourable Moslems as well (and perfidious and treacherous ones also). Lamb was also fascinated by the Mongols (he wrote a biography of Genghis Khan) and was surprisingly sympathetic towards them. Some of the best stories in this volume involve the Mongols and Tatars, including the novellas The Grand Cham and The Golden Horde and the novel The Making of the Morning Star.

Lamb’s heroes are not kings or even princes but mostly landless knights or adventurers, men on the periphery of greatness or men caught up in great events.

There are brave women as well in these tales. Lamb admired courage and daring regardless of race or gender.

Lamb’s style is somewhat more literary than the usual run of pulp writers but he had the pulp writer’s awareness of the importance of pacing and excitement. His plotting is skillful and well thought out. His stories aren’t just a collection of exciting incidents - he knew how to build a tale towards a satisfactory climax, bringing the hero to his appointed point of destiny.

He was fascinated by civilisations in transition, either on the verge of greatness or in the process of decline. His crusader stories do not deal with the glories of the First Crusade or with the Kingdom of Jerusalem at the height of its power, or even with the exploits of great crusader heroes like Richard Lionheart. Lamb was more interested in the period when the doomed surviving crusader princedoms were struggling for survival.

Lamb’s view of the Crusades was complex but ultimately tragic. You certainly won’t find him espousing the modern and fashionably politically correct view of the Crusades as a war of aggression against peace-loving Islamic civilisations, but neither will you find him adopting a simplistic triumphalist tone. Courage and honour, and treachery and cowardice, can be found in every civilisation at every period of history. You also won’t find modern ideas about universal peace and brotherhood in these pages. Civiliations that are unable or unwilling to fight for their own survival do not and never will survive.

A collection of fine stories by a master story teller, highly recommended.

[Jim Kuenzli · Rating 4 out of 5]

Large collection of Lamb stories of some type of Western protagonist, usually a crusader, current, or former, ending up in central Asia. Great adventure in many locales including Persian lands, Turkish Steppes, India, China, lands of Timor, The steppes of the Golden Horde, England, Venice, and many other regions. Excellent historical adventure stories, well researched, and delivered. Recommend!

[Joseph · Rating 4 out of 5]

The fifth Bison Press collection of Harold Lamb's truly outstanding adventure fiction, collected and edited very ably by Howard Andrew Jones.

The previous four collections brought together all of Lamb's Cossack stories, taking place mostly on the Central Asian steppes, mostly in or around the 16th Century. This volume brings together Lamb's stories of the Crusaders -- three shortish novels and a dozen or so shorter stories. Which isn't to say that they're stories of the Crusades, for the most part -- they're stories of men who had joined one or another of the Crusades (or were born to Crusader fathers in the Holy Land), but they're generally going off and getting into adventures or shenanigans in lands further east, from Persia all the way to, in one case, Xanadu, with a walk-on cameo by a certain famous Venetian traveler.

At risk of repeating myself, these are great stuff -- well researched, tightly plotted, colorful and action-packed, and extremely readable.

[Charles · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm a fan of Lamb's work but this was--perhaps--too much of a good thing. It's a huge book with lots of stories, but so big that I found it somewhat awkward to handle. There's also a certain sameness to many of the stories so I found it best to read a story or two and take a break from it for a while. There's a lot of great characterizations here, again with a certain sameness among many of them, and lots of cool settings with great historical detail.

[David Welch · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would give this 4.5 stars only because a few of the stories are shorter and somewhat predictable, a fact that is mentioned in the introduction due to said stories being published in more upscale magazines favoring shorter stories. They're still fun tales, but they lack the complexity or excitement of the longer novellas. The longer works are what make this book, and the other Harold Lamb collections from Bison Books, excellent. Though the language is a little old-sounding (Even considering the time period Lamb was writing in), it is never hard to understand. The plots move quickly and the characters, western or eastern, villain or good guy, are developed and interesting. The best in this collection are the two novellas featuring Nial, The Grand Cham, and the novel length Making of The Morning Star. One note, though this book advertises itself as a collection of Crusader stories, most of the tales center around Crusaders heading East and running into Mongols or other nomadic empires, not on the Holy Lands themselves. Still great fun to read.

[Hippocleides · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is 20's pulp adventure--essentially Robert E. Howard only with a historical, medieval context rather than a fantasy "Conan the Barbarian" one. And so while there are some great lines here and there, and the various short stories in concept (the stealing of a jewel from the Golden Khans in Sarai, or a Crusader leading the defense of Bokhara against the Mongols, etc) are intriguing, there are all the inherent problems of it being 20's pulp adventure. Pretty much every female character is the same thin, 17-year-old beautifully-pouting princess and every male protagonist is brave, forthright, and from Northern or Western Europe. Mongols are always cruel but noble. Muslims are often but not always the antagonists, and you'll never find a hero among the Italians or Greeks. Typically, the novellas in this collection were better as they had more time to stray from predictability. All in all, a decent collection of short stories.

[Dragoonfliy · Rating 4 out of 5]

My Dad lent this to me a few summers ago after he read (and raved) about it. If you're looking for historical, slightly fantasy stories then look no further.

The whole collection is a series of short stories and novellas chronicling various crusaders and other warriors are they explore the Holy Lands, Far East, and beyond. The plots are pretty formulaic, guy is a warrior, guy defeats villain, wins favor of those in power, and then gets the girl, but there's enough variety within the stories to keep you intrigued throughout the whole anthology. There also some intriguing almost paranormal elements thrown into some of the stories.