I know this may not be the best place to ask, so please mods, remove if necessary.
I've been curious about the Middle Ages and the crusades overall and am looking for interesting books on the subjects, though not so dry to the point that I'd only be reading it because of a college paper. Any recommendations would be helpful!
This is certainly a subject which has been extensively written about, so there are always more books to recommend, but this answer from u/WelfOnTheShelf may be helpful for you.
I can reccomend Paul M Cobb's The Race For Paradise: An Islamic History of the Crusades. It is informative and detailed, relying on primary sources heavily, whilst being readable to the average amateur historian. It does, as the title would suggest, focus universally on the Crusades from the Islamic context, but I found it painted a fulfilling portrait of the Islamic world into which the Crusades broke, and its experience of those times.
The Crusades aren't really a field of interest for me, and naturally I'd welcome any other perspectives from more knowledgeable folk who've read the book. (Cobb is a Professor of Islamic History at UPENN, so he has some cachet.
Paul M. Cobb, The Race for Paradise: An Islamic History of the Crusades. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.
I haven’t seen Christopher Tyerman’s work mentioned here yet, but he has a whole catalogue of books on the period and is arguably the greatest living scholar of the Crusades.
God’s War is a tremendous overview (I have not read it all, but it is brilliant on the First Crusade and phenomenally detailed). How To Plan A Crusade focuses on different aspects of the campaigns chapter by chapter, although I’d advise a look at his Very Short Introduction to The Crusades before exploring this. He also has a few complex works focusing on debates around the crusades and even England’s role in them.
My favourite thing about Tyerman is how he mentioned in his earlier works about Walter Sans Avoir (apologies if I misspelled) and how this man’s name is evidence that people went on crusade to earn wealth and land. In his later works, however, he kindly notes that this is wrong and that Sans Avoir is a place in France. It shows a scholar open to admitting he is wrong - something others are often afraid to do!
Christopher Tyerman: God’s War; A Very Short Introduction - The Crusades; How to Plan a Crusade; The Debate on the Crusades; England and the Crusades