Strange landscape: A journey through the Middle Ages

Christopher Frayling's Strange Landscape (A Journey Through the Middle Ages) is a companion book to the BBC series. Having never seen the series I cannot compare the two (although having read the book I would be fascinated how this could possibly have worked on television). The book has a marvelous introduction (the best part) that looks at the concept of the Middle Ages in today's culture and then follows with a section on cathedral building, the Cathars and St. Francis, Abelard versus Bernard of Clairvaux, and Dante. It is a very selective and idiosyncratic look at the middle ages but still quite interesting, both in its selection and its handling of material.