Asia: A Concise History

I had previously enjoyed another book edited by Mr. Cotterel on ancient History, so I was eager to read this.Although it necessarily has to go very quickly and lightfooted over such an enormous subject matter, I think the book reaches its goals.Any reader needs to have some notions of the History of at least some of the regions of Asia in order not to get lost with so much information, but that said, the book is wisely organized, balanced, and well written. Dates and names do appear, but only as helpful references, for the main speech rather relies on bigger topics such as the general evolution of societies and civilizations involved. This makes it easy to follow, but also convenient to have a basic mental map in which to fit the pieces.All in all, the book provides a good general overview and can be a useful introduction to further reading in more specific areas (whether geographical in nature or other), to which end the bibliography section is a good help.Recommended.

The telling goes so fast and is very brief in the first ca. 1/3 of the book, so that I do not manage to get a feel of the societies the author is discussing. And it feels like region is almost the only thing that is being discussed. I know it was and is an important part of societies and defined their lives in many ways, but still it would be much more interesting to see how the people's lives were organised, try to understand how it was to live in that time in that specific country.

My husband bought this to read to our teens after dinner each night. We all found this book to be clear, concise, and informative. Each chapter was short enough to keep us all focused and interesting enough to keep us all talking about it. I'd highly recommend this to anyone!

In an effort to be consise, the author wanders a bit. He goes into detail on some things, and I sometimes can't figure out his system for choosing what is important to highlight and what isn't.

b

Interesting to read. My teenagers said it was enjoyable history. That is high praise!

Book was required for my History of Asia class, that i did not pass. lol

I like this book, though of course it is not perfect. Cotterell attempts, with good success, a comprehensive overview of the entire continent of Asia in less than 500 pages. This is a bold challenge, but he succeeds in giving a good portrait and sketch of the history of Asia. There are omissions that are occasionally frustrating and parts of the writing at some times confusing, but overall I think he portrays a fairly bold and clear picture of the development of many civilizations from ancient Shang China and Harappa-India to the present. So a flawed gem of history, I recommend it to those interested in the region.

This book does what the title claims to in providing a concise history. It had a good pace, and is very sensibly ordered by area and era. Narrative threads weave through multiple geographies and periods, but are not reductionist, instead demonstrating the complex patterns that have shaped Asia. The chapter lengths were perfect for reading whilst commuting. The earlier chapters seem particularly passionately written; I found them to be the most engaging. The recent history (post-WWII) seems much briefer, although I understand that some people would consider this a subject for a book on politics rather than history. My only criticism is very minor: there is a tendency in some chapters for the author to switch between different names for the same individual, which I found quite confusing at times.

I rated this work three stars not at the fault of the author, but at the fault of the concept. Even the author mentions that a comprehensive history of Asia isn't the greatest idea, and it shows in this book. The problem is that the topic is far too broad to be contained in one book, and by trying to cover so much, hardly any of this places and periods are done the justice that they should.If nothing else, Cotterell strings the various geographic areas into a realistic narrative which you can look deeper into elsewhere if you have the interest.