{"id":72,"date":"2015-11-02T14:27:50","date_gmt":"2015-11-02T14:27:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/?page_id=72"},"modified":"2018-11-06T02:14:35","modified_gmt":"2018-11-06T02:14:35","slug":"reviews","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/?page_id=72","title":{"rendered":"REVIEWS"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tiber: Eternal River of Rome<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThis engaging book carries the reader along on an entertaining and often illuminating journey that traverses the entire course of the river\u2019s history from antiquity until the twentieth century. Allen has assembled a collection of stories that are alternately charming, scandalous, intriguing, and informative, relating how the lives of individuals\u2014ranging from painters to popes, shepherds to saints, and emperors to aviators\u2014have intertwined with the Tiber.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014Prof. Gregory S. Aldrete, author of Floods of the Tiber in Ancient Rome<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cTiber provides a thoroughly enjoyable gallimaufry, engagingly written, [ranging] through Rome\u2019s history from the riverside view, with much curious learning lightly displayed. Good fun, with something for everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014Robert Twigger, author of Red Nile: A Biography of the World\u2019s Greatest River<\/a><\/p>\n

“Allen (The Great Siege of Malta<\/em>) offers readers a miscellanea of anecdotes and sketches related to the Tiber in Rome, arranged in a generally chronological order. Emperors, popes, and other nobility\u2014both secular and clerical\u2014rub elbows with more common folk in these pages. Some themes feature prominently, such as descriptions of military action and recurrences of the Roman mob, last seen in 1944, tossing into the river the Fascist prison warden Donato Carretta. Other executions, suicides, and deaths by misadventure are included, as are floods and vagaries of the river, and somewhat random tidbits on ancient sewers, dragons, and the Renaissance-era occupation of fishing out firewood as it floated by. Bridges that span the river make several appearances, as do things hidden by its depths, ranging from the apocryphal story that the river\u2019s bottom was lined with bronze sheeting to assorted sunken treasures including statues and a lost train. Alas, \u201cthe river… is now cut off from easy access, and largely from view.\u201d With this amusing and delightful compendium of historical Tiber trivia, Allen has given readers a view of the river after all.”<\/p>\n

\u2014Publishers’ Weekly<\/p>\n

The Great Siege of Malta<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThe epic siege of Malta of 1565 deserved this book. The unthinkable happened when a small Christian army stood up to and defeated the mightiest military forces of the century, and that is always something to chant about and to celebrate. It is not that the Great Siege had been forgotten by historians and by novelists\u2014anything but. What that-larger-than-life event lacked was a retelling, passionate and accurate, historically faithful and stirring, hauling the readers in, never to let hold of them. This is what Bruce Ware Allen\u2019s account manages to achieve: to tell a true story that reads faster than a racy novel, to mold the stuff of legend to wholly human dimensions.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014Giovanni Bonello, former Judge of the European Court of Human Rights and author of Histories of Malta<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

“Bruce Ware Allen\u2019s The Great Siege of Malta<\/em> is remarkable for the thoroughness of his research and his ability to portray the protagonists as three-dimensional human beings, warts and all.\u00a0 As an example, I was aware of Francis I’s shallowness, vanity, and athletic abilities–he out-wrestled Henry VIII at the Field of the Cloth of Gold!–but didn’t know that Charles V showered his conversation partners with spittle! This is a fine piece of scholarship, well-researched, convincingly argued and engagingly written.”<\/p>\n

\u2014Prof. John F. Guilmartin, Jr. OSU,\u00a0author of Galley’s and Gunpowder<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cBased on a rich corpus of documentation from a variety of European archives, Allen\u2019s book offers us a thorough military analysis of perhaps the most important amphibious operation of the sixteenth-century Mediterranean. His eye for the detail, his rigor in juxtaposing historical data, and his clear prose produced a diligent study that makes an enjoyable read for both academic and non-academic audiences.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014Dr. Emrah Safa G\u00fcrkan, assistant professor of history, Istanbul 29 Mayis University<\/p>\n

\u201cThis book offers many excellent things: it\u2019s a gripping read, and its scholarship opens a window onto a fascinating world. It provides deep insights into the nature of war and battle \u2013 or perhaps one should say into human nature \u2013 as well as providing some very thought-provoking parallels with today\u2019s geopolitical situation. Highly recommended to all readers<\/p>\n

\u2014Naval Historical Foundation<\/p>\n

\u201cAllen\u2019s mastery of the subject is evident throughout, and his is the most extensive bibliography of relevant materials to date, including as it does previously unutilized sources.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u2014Military History Quarterly<\/p>\n

“Allen has done a fine job of researching his subject. His footnotes bristle with references to relevant primary sources both Christian and Ottoman. . . . The writing is is lucid and crisp, which makes for a readable book.”<\/p>\n

\u2014The Sixteenth Century Journal<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tiber: Eternal River of Rome \u201cThis engaging book carries the reader along on an entertaining and often illuminating journey that traverses the entire course of the river\u2019s history from antiquity until the twentieth century. Allen has assembled a collection of stories that are alternately charming, scandalous, intriguing, and informative, relating how the lives of individuals\u2014ranging … Continue reading REVIEWS<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":4,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/72"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=72"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/72\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136,"href":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/72\/revisions\/136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brucewareallen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=72"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}