I am so out of touch with the European end of things that his claims there are impossible at present for me to assess. They are large claims, about Hun influence on Europe subsequently (as per his The Huns, Rome and the Birth of Europe, more briefly dealt with here).

But the strength of the book is obvious: that he integrates Hun history from East Asia (yes, the Xiongnu), to Central Asia (White Huns, etc.), to the European Huns. Hyun Jin Kim is across the sources in order to do this, and that's pretty rare. One basic misunderstanding has been that the search for continuity between the Chinese-named Xiongnu and the Huns as known in Europe, used to focus on whether there is an 'ethnic', 'blood descent', racial link. Whereas of course the link is political and to do with the Huns' enormous political prestige and legacy. As typical for steppe societies the Huns were ethnically very mixed indeed, and our understanding of connections must not be in those old terms, blood and race.

So this is an overview of the Huns from China to Rome, integrated by Kim's Inner Asian perspective. The political institutions of the Huns were extremely long-lived and tenacious, although unfortunately we still have to try to see them from the outside in -- that is, from the written accounts of settled societies. His ideas on the enduring political and cultural legacy in Europe are challenging and probably overreach. But his work is a massive step forward in knowledge of the Huns.

As a new standard history of the Huns, this doesn't read as easily as one might wish. It is, however, aimed at a general audience. I have a couple of popular histories of the Huns, but until this information filters into a popular format, you'd miss far too much if you went elsewhere. ( )