Re: The Byzantines
She is a good writer. The book is quite amazing as it covers Islamic history in a good manner (which include beginning of Islam, Period of Khulafa e Rashideen, Ummayads, Abbasid, Safavid, Turks, India). The book is not lengthy to lose readers interest. The reader may then chose to read detailed works on any particular period of his / her own choice.
I’ve not gone through any work on Islam’s history in English which is concise and effective like this one. Otherwise, in Urdu (which the kaur can’t read) , there are number of books on the subject. Recently, I purchased Charagh Hussain Hasrat’s ‘Sarguzaht e Islam’ in 3 volumes just for Rs 75 from expo. The book covers period upto Abbasid in Urdu.