This book tries to do too much. It covers the entire history of the area encompassed by the Silk Roads from earliest times all the way up to modern times. Of course, a book of such magnitude can't go into much detail: the author often mentions different peoples, kingdoms and religions, but gives ZERO information about them, so they just become a list of alien sounding words. I just couldn't slog through it: got bored and overwhelmed and quit about 1/3 of the way through. Tons of information, but not what I wanted.

Impressive review of history from the point of view, essentially, of the middle east. It thesis (though unstated) is that if you follow the sources and uses of wealth around the world throughout history, you will then find the history that matters. The examples were reasonably detailed, but so many many characters kept being introduced and the time periods would go back and forth or overlap that it was quite hard to draw the line of logic through this writing. Nonetheless, you will learn good things

The first part was excellent, and the basic statement about how history is seen too much from western perspective was well argumented.

The second part about more modern history was very much about history of european nation states, even though that was one of the main problems he declared in the first part.

I happened to read the Sapiens at the same time when I was reading this, and I do wonder why there was so little economic history in the second part, even though so much happened during that period. The second part was mainly about wars and conflicts, and reasoning behind those, but it didn't touch on what happened in other areas, e.g. technology, socities, and so on.

Excellent book, but doesn't quite reach the level of what it promises. Therefore only three stars, even though I can understand that based on effort and accuracy the book could also be given five stars easily.

Just finished reading The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan. It's like a world history course in a single book. Not for the faint-of-heart or the squeamish reader. A real eye-opener. Enormously helpful in explaining historical events leading up to today's world events. Although I've always been aware of governments making decisions and taking actions "for the greater good," after reading this book, I can't say that I'm proud of things said and done by the American government. The only somewhat comfort I take away is that America is certainly not alone when it comes to bad foreign policy decisions and actions. This assumes that all of the facts reported in this book are true and accurate. Read it for yourself and then decide.

This is not a lightweight read. It is a history-lovers delight, though. Peter Frankopan is very capable with the tone, words, and movement to make this read interesting and very informative. Highly recommend.