Sloppy. Relies very heavily on quotes that aren't particularly poignant. Quotes aren't the same as fact - or even ostensible fact. Three stars solely for how jam packed the book is with dates and information, but the authors really should have focused more on aiding reader comprehension and deciding on the proper balance between academic/journalistic and glib. I highlighted "Tigress" River. Could have happened to anyone, but rowrr nonetheless.

The beginning of this book has a lot of useful information on the formation of ISIS. The authors present a lot of detailed information on Az-Zarqawi and Al-Qaeda in Iraq and how this ultimately led to the formation of ISIS. I think they did a a pretty good job describing how the power vacuum left by the US led invasion allowed Al-Qaeda in Iraq to flourish, which in turn, allowed ISIS to form. They also present a lot of useful information on how the advancement of Shi'a leaders at the cost of Sunnis led to the insurgency and ultimately, ISIS.

However, as the book went on it dragged. The book is pretty dry and I found it difficult to finish. The chapters that actually focus on ISIS as it is now were boring. The authors managed to interview a few ISIS members but what they said about their motivations is nothing new. If you've kept up with the news for the past year, nothing in the second half is enlightening.

Takes you from the start to around Jan 2016. Very densely written, full of information, names, places etc. I had to read some parts twice to fully comprehend since its so thick with information and allot of it actually flew right past me but it is a very professionally written book, advanced reading, no popular airport book about ISIS.

Very good book on the subject. Builds up context in almost every country/political actor and provides insight into some of the underlying religious and political ideology. Shows how propaganda is used on every side, and further how complicated every aspect of the situation is.

Scary and discouraging - but also fascinating. It takes some work to keep track of all the people and organizations, but it's worth the effort. The book needs an index; I had to create my own.

Goes beyond the head chopping. Insight into the who and why in Syria and Iraq.

This book surely gives some useful insights into the cult of terror. What it lacks is a coherent explanation of the ethnographic and historical factors that fostered an environment for a Islamist cult such as ISIS to survive and thrive.

It lacks academic value chiefly because Weiss has written this from a journalistic perspective, but it is a good read anyways.

One of the problems with writing about ISIS is how quickly things change. This book certainly doesn't fall into the “hastily cobbled together to cash in” category: but reading about the Charlie Hebdo killings in a book that was released only a few weeks afterwards is still rather odd. And the ability to do so belies the main problem I had with the book — it's mostly just plain factual reporting. I'm very far from expert in this area, so there was a lot of new information to me, but I was constantly struggling to piece it all together into anything coherent.

In that regard, I found The Atlantic's What ISIS Really Wants feature much better. I came away from that thinking I understood the issue better, rather than simply having more facts. Yes, it oversimplifies at times, and gets a few things wrong (Think Progress, for example, have an interesting response), but I'd recommend reading that article first, and then following it with a book like this only if you want a deeper factual background.

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ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham) is much more than a terrorist group - it's a fanatic but well organized army. Rooted on the pretense of defending the Sunni minority (especially the Salafists), they share the goal of building a caliphate based on the sharia law, meaning they have jiadist dendencies against the US (and other foreign states) but against the Gulf states as well. Their strength comes from guerrillia techniques, propaganda and usage of media
ISIS begun with a man named Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and his mentor Al-Maqdis, thei founder of Bayt al-Imam (jihadist cell) who gained a following and eventually reached an agreement with al-Quaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Their partnership was the basis for the formation of isis. With the start of the war in Iraq, al-Zarqawi found fertile ground for recruits especially among former Baathists. Since his group was leading most (42%) of the terrorist attacks, he started gaining attention from the media (that and the videotaped beheadings). Yet at first the majority of his group's targets were Shia, so to incite civil war between Shia and Sunni. In 2006 he was killed in a bomb strikeout, but this only inspired his folllwers (al-Masai and al-Baghdadi) to found ISIS. While al-Qaddafi got kicked out of Iraq, ISIS stayed in the hiding and slowly built its network, only to show its power in Syria later on.