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Named One of the Top 10 Adventure Books of 2005 by Men's Journal
''In this book you will be introduced to individuals whose courage and curiosity opened new channels of understanding across seemingly insurmountable cultural barriers...This is a fascinating journey''- Milbry Polk, author of Women of Discovery: A Celebration of Intrepid Women Who Explored the World.
More than a century before the recent conflicts with Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden and Islamic insurgents, an international crisis ignited between the United States and the Middle East. In May 1904, Moroccan warlord Mulai Ahmed el Raisuni kidnapped Ion Perdicaris, a wealthy Greek-American resident of Tangier, in an attempt to extort money from the Sultan of Morocco. President Theodore Roosevelt responded by dispatching a squadron of seven battleships to the Moroccan coast with the order: Perdicaris alive or Raisuni dead. The nine-week standoff between US troops and Raisuni exposed the
impotence of emerging American power and revealed a critical misunderstanding about Moroccan politics. When it was discovered that Perdicaris was not an Amercian citizen after all, the US government kept the embarrassing episode secret until 1933. Profiting royally from the conflict, Raisuni built his palace, the ''House of Tears'', soon after.
In this page-turning blend of compelling adventure and travel narrative, historian John Hughes reintroduces this and other vintage tales of Westerners who traveled to Islamic lands. Here we witness Englishman Thomas Pellow's rise from slave of a homicidal sultan - a man who kept the ears of his victims as trophies - to commander of the Moroccan army in the 1700s. A century later, London Timescorrespondent and professional adventurer Walter B. Harris risks his life by entering the holy city of Chefchouaen, Morocco, in disguise. In his account of Constantinople in 1916, John Reed describes an
empire teetering on the brink of collapse. And who could forget Lowell Thomas's legendary account of the man who would become known as ''Lawrence of Arabia''? Woven throughout these stories is the collaboration between Muslims and Westerners as together they faced perilous journeys across deserts, mountain passes, and into forbidden cities.
House of Tearsis a treasury of the most exciting and revealing narratives ever published about the Islamic world from the last several decades. Not only is this Explorers Club Book a fine compendium of true adventure stories, but it is also a collection that celebrates the fine nuances of cultural encounters, in times of peace as well as conflict.
About the Author
Dr John Hughes was educated in Canada and the United Kingdom. He has written about British history and has taught European history in the United States and Canada. He is currently on the faculty at St George's School in Vancouver, Canada.

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