CROSSROADS OF EMPIRE

In Cooper’s historical novel, a British teenager suffers amnesia after fighting in the Flemish Resistance in 1914 Paris.

Evan Sinclair is only 16 years old, but he has already lived an extravagantly dramatic life—he’s fought with the Flemish Resistance in Paris, was wounded by a gunshot, and has been recommended for the Victoria Cross for his bravery. When the Austrium, a hospital ship conveying him back to England, is sunk by a German U-boat, Evan washes ashore at Lyme Regis. As a result of physical injury and mental strain, he loses the whole of his memory, a condition that persists after his wounds heal, leaving him unsettled; his predicament is affectingly portrayed by the author: “And that empty darkness scares me more with each passing day.” With the help of his cousin Harry, who finds Evan after recognizing him in a picture, he begins to study his family genealogy, which can be traced back to the First Crusade in the 11th century—his ancestor, Henri de St. Clair, was among the original Knights Templar. Cooper presents a fascinatingly unorthodox, if ultimately unconvincing, interpretation of World War I in which its principal cause is Kaiser Wilhelm’s desire to take over Jerusalem, crown himself as its king and as Holy Roman emperor, and usher in a new age of German pagan rule. Unfortunately, this interpretation takes the plot on a derivative and ludicrous tour of supernatural conceits, including immortality and mysterious “energy pathways” that connect the great monuments of the world in some geometrical pattern. What begins as a captivating historical chronicle fused with a personal drama—Evan’s quest to rediscover himself is the emotional core of the novel—devolves into fantastical tale that is neither plausible nor fresh.

A historical novel that loses its way when it transitions to a supernaturally charged adventure story.