From the publisher website:
Welcome to a land of contrasts ...
From the lofty mountains of Asia Minor to the luxuriant green of the Nile valley, from ageless cities to young kingdoms, from bustling sea ports to impregnable castles. Welcome to a land torn between religious wars and tortuous politics, theater of the clash between East and West, a place where two cultures collide. Welcome to a land of wonders, haunted by stone memories of lost civilizations, inhabited by powerful sorcerers, home to the finest scholars of both worlds. Welcome to a land of opportunities, where the lucky and strong can achieve fame and riches beyond measure, but where the corpses of the weak and the slow litter the ground. Blood and Sand is the guide to the Hermetic tribunal of the Levant. It details the mundane and Hermetic geography and history of the area, shaped by Islam and the Crusades. It describes the mundane and magical inhabitants of the region, be they emirs in mighty castles or traders in the Latin states, magi of Hermes or Muslim sorcerers, jinn or naddahas. From the Ark of the Covenant to the criminal underworld of Acre, this book provides everything you need for a saga set in this most volatile of Hermetic tribunals.\z