I have never read such a rancid, acidic reading of history such as is found in this book. Mr. Holland distorts, overwrites, and simply skims over anything that lends any credence to the Islamo-Arab Empire as one of humanity's great civilizations. No reforms of the economy are to be found here, no scientific and technological achievements by Islamic scientists. Nothing. Islam in this book is iconoclastically defaced, and erased from human history. Pay no attention to the Arabs, those savages!