The Disorderly Knights
Dorothy Dunnett
703 pages
published in 1966

This is the third novel in the Lymond sequence, chronicling the adventures of Francis Lymond, Scottish nobleman, adventurier and soldier of fortune. While in the previous installment of the series, Queen's Play he was in service to the Mary of Guise, queen-regent of Scotland, in this novel he's asked to help the Order of St. John defend their island home of Malta against the Turks.

Said order having long since degenerated from being the defenders of the Holy Land, to a political tool in the hands of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles the fifth. Internally, the order is divided in loyalty, with the Spanish and French knights mistrusting each other and the Grand Master of the Order unwilling to do much towards the defence of the Order's possesions. The one figure most of the knights have pinned their hopes on is Graham Malet, a saintly man, as well as an able commander and knight. Almost needless to say, he and Lymond don't get along. The plot quickly moves away from the defence of Malta, the later part of the book takes place mostly in Scotland.

I found this book to be a bit of a curate's egg: part of it were good, parts of it not so. If I'm honest, this goes for all the Lymond books I've read and while I can see the attraction in them, I don't think they deserve the reputation they have. Dorothy Dunnett has some stylistic authorial tics that drove me up the wall after a while reading this as well as other of her books, the main being the way she tries to misdirect the reader. Caveat lector.