The Tower

First paragraph:

The column advanced slowly in the glare of the sky and the sand. The oasis of Cydamus with its clear waters and fresh dates, was no more than a memory. It had been many days since they'd departed, wary about their mission from the very start, and the southern horizon continued to recede - empty, false, slipping away like the mirages that danced among the dunes.

Think of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Now make the main character fall in love and become really stupid. Yeah, you would not have liked Indiana Jones as an adult acting like a teenager falling in love for the first time.

The Tower features Philip Garrett searching for his father Desmond Garrett in a corny adventure story set in the 1930s northern African desert. There is a little bit of The Da Vinci Code thrown in with the Vatican fighting over the same treasure but luckily the writing is not as bad as Dan Brown.

Valerio Massimo Manfredi wrote the story in Italian then the book was translated to English by Christine Feddersen-Manfredi. There are some word choices and phrases that look like they were literal translations instead of the best choice in English. There are excellent historical references and descriptions that give the story realism for the parts set in Italy, where Manfredi lives.

Some of the desert sections are confusing because the characters wander into the middle east and back. At times they take days to travel short distances while other times they zoom across long distances in what seems like an instance. Some of the coincidental meetings are explained by the need to stop at a limited number of oases for water.

The story starts back when the Romans controlled Egypt, jumps forward to 1930 and uses historical references thousands of years before the Romans to build an unbelievable but fun dramatic history as the background to Philip Garrett's heroic search for his father and the soggy puppy dog style one-true-love side story. I prefer the Indiana Jones style love-in-the-desert side stories.

The rest of The Tower is good reading. Phillip Garret is the reluctant hero too long at the start. We know he has to join in the chase or there would be no story. The good and bad priests and everyone else are well crafted to the level needed to give the story realism. Manfredi must travel in the middle east enough to know some of the tribal customs and cultural differences.

Manfredi wrote a number of earlier books set near the time of the opening chapter. Historical dramas can be heavy due to the need to describe everything. The Tower is mostly set in the 1930s and we see enough of the 1930s in movies to be familiar with their weaponry and transport, two things that influence progress in The Tower. Going back to an earlier period for a whole book can be tedious. His book
The Last Legion will be released as a movie so I tried to read The Last Legion before seeing the movie. The Last Legion was not as entertaining as The Tower.

Conclusion

The Tower is worth reading and may be the best Manfredi book for a modern audience.