Book recommendation

Through conversation with one of my classmates, I learned that our instructor is a cousin of the French-Lebanese writer Amin Maalouf, who wrote a well-received book on the Crusades from the Arab perspective. My local library didn't have a copy of that on the shelf, but it did have In the Name of Indentity, an interesting book dissecting how identity today is often reduced to a single facet, then used as an excuse for atrocities. I haven't read far yet, but it is quite interesting.