Crescent Dawn: The Rise of the Ottoman Empire and the Making of the Modern Age

In this highly detailed history of the Ottoman Empire, Sheppard (political science and international relations, Long Island Univ.; Patriot vs. Loyalist) painstakingly regales readers with the story of how the Ottomans came quite close to conquering all of Europe. His book indicates that only fate seemed responsible for preventing the Ottoman juggernaut from overwhelming all of Christendom. Sheppard argues that the early modern period in Europe cannot be fully understood without analyzing how the Ottoman threat both unified and, at times, divided Christian kingdoms. Collectively, Europe felt under siege for hundreds of years by the ambitions and Machiavellian maneuverings of the Ottoman Empire. Significantly, it was during these centuries that people first saw the beginnings of globalization—an interconnectedness between distant cultures created by conquests, treaties, and appeasement.