Bleaseworld

When I posted about Osprey's planned foray into the world of comics, I mentioned Garth Ennis recent War Stories and Battlefields series. It was only later that I realised i had only read the War Stories comics and not the Battlefields ones, so quickly popped an order off to Amazon for the first of the three collections of stories.

I must say the three collected stories in the volume one are all excellent stories and superbly illustrated by three different artists. Ennis certainly doesn't pull his punches in describing the horrors of war and these are certainly not kids comics.

The three stories are The Night Witches, the story of Soviet female aviators in the Great Patriotic War, The Tankies, a story of a novice British tank crew in Normandy and Dear Billy. The latter is an incredibly moving story of a young nurse in the Far East and her traumatic experiences. All three of the stories had a cinematic quality to them, but Dear Billy would make for a great film.

Wargamers will get a lot out of The Night Witches and Tankies, but all three stories are excellent and Battlefields volume one is well worth getting hold of...

Really gutted to hear that Sir Terry Pratchett has passed away at age 66, I still remember buying my copy of The Colour of Magic when it came out have been a fan ever since...

"Some people believe that when you die, you cross the River of Death and have to pay the ferryman. People don’t seem to worry about that these days. Perhaps there’s a bridge now."

I finished The Moscow Option yesterday whilst sat at CDG and have been pondering it since. I didn't think there would be a lot of alternative gaming potential in it, but I was wrong.

(Ok, there are spoilers ahead if you are going to read the book, so stop now).

The alternate 1941 offers little, the battles being extensions of what happened historically, 1942 though is a different matter...

Whilst the invasion of Malta may have little different to that of Crete, other than the opposed Italian beach landings, the fall of Egypt has some limited involvement of a rebellious Egyptian army and the battles in Palestine have some fascinating actions between the Germans and a combined Anglo-American army. The fall of the Cacasus to the Germans leads to a German invasion of Iraq and Iran, with Soviet units fighting alongside the British, whilst in the Far East, the Japanese army gets a bloody nose when it invades Siberia.

All these scenarios are easy to play out using mid-war kit, but will give you a realistic background to what you are doing if you fancy. A really good book, it is a shame Downing did not write the sequel, especially as him tantalisingly mentions a German Civil War between the SS and the Heer at the end!

Today was a perfect storm, the dreaded tax return and a visit to the dentist! :-(

However there was a ray of sunshine. I forget to take something to read in the waiting room so popped in a charity shop to find a copy of John Masters Bugle and a Tiger. I have read a number of Masters books over the years including Nightrunners of Bengal and The Deceivers, but found this was an autobiography of his early years as an officer in India just before WWII.

I only managed to get a little way into it before I was dragged kicking and screaming into the surgery, but found it captivating. A little bit of research uncovered a second volume, Road Past Mandalay, which covers his wartime exploits, which I shall be hunting out once I have finished this.

When I was a teenager I was something of a prodigious reader, mostly fantasy epics. However I recall faced with one lengthy train journey from Bristol to Edinburgh picking up a J.T.Edson book at Temple Meads station. Whilst I enjoyed watching westerns, as a literary genre it never really appealed (and strangely still doesn't), but the book, You're in Command Now, Mr.Fog, wasn't a western per se, but one of Edson's books set in the American Civil War.


The story, about Confederate cavalry officer, Dusty Fog (who returns in a number of Edson's post-ACW westerns), was great fun and I made an effort to hunt out more of the ACW adventures in various bookshops over the next couple of years. I recall picking up the likes of Under Stars and Bars and Kill Dusty Fog!, but in those pre-internet days it was hard to know how many there were set in the ACW and how many where about Dusty Fog and the Texas Light Cavalry (some ACW stories were about different characters).

Fortunately in this day and age it is a relatively simple process to find out this information and Goodreads provides a list of all 13 books in the series and a synopsis of each. I need to hunt out the few I bought in my youth, but there do appear to be a number I have never read which appear to be quite fun.

What brought this all to mind? Well I was messing about with the Perry ACW cavalry at lunchtime and inspired by something Iron Mitten did many moons ago inspired by a Rosemary Sutcliffe book, I think that the Texas Light Cavalry need bringing to the tabletop!

I seem to be missing my hobby get up and go - if anyone finds it, please return it!

In an effort to kickstart things I ordered myself John Wilcox's Bayonets Along The Border, a Simon Fonthill novel I was missing. Perhaps some shenanigans along the Khyber Pass will get the hobby blood pumping and the juices flowing...

I hate it when this happens! :-(

Hot on the heels of watching The Man in the High Castle yesterday, a copy of David Downing's The Moscow Option arrived in the post today. Downing is probably best know for his 'Station' series of detective stories set in mid C20th Germany, but this is written as a history book, rather than a Turtledove style alt-history novel.

Downing's approach is nicely done, rather than make major historical changes he takes a couple of points of divergence and takes it from there. The first key one is Hitler being incapacitated before the decision to concentrate on Kiev and the Ukraine before resuming the advance on Moscow. Here Downing has the German High Command continue the push on Moscow and takes things from there.

I'm only a couple of chapters into the book, but am enjoying it. I'm not sure how much alt-history gaming potential there is, after all a battle between forces German and Soviet in 1942 will look the same whether that is to the east or west of Moscow, but it is proving a good read.

Still coughing and spluttering here and facing a tedious journey to Birmingham tomorrow, I felt in need of a literary pick me up. Not in the mood for anything too highbrow I discovered that Wildside Press' Megapack e-book series now includes two volumes of G.A. Henty novels.

A Victorian author, Henty wrote many historical adventure books from ancient times through to Victorian. A bit "Boys Own" I suppose but I enjoyed Death in the Snow about the Retreat from Moscow in 1812 when I read it a year back and 40 novels for a quid was too good a bargain to pass up.

I also picked up (for 39p) the Talbot Mundy Megapack, an author I am not familiar with, but the reviews were good and with stories set in the Khyber Pass, it had to be worth a try.

Hopefully this will keep me entertained on the train tomorrow - and no doubt inspire me to start even more projects that won't get finished!

The Megapack series covers a whole range of genres (SF, Western, Adventure, Detective etc) and it is worth having a look at. Just stick megapack in the search facility of the Kindle Store and see...

Amazon is rapidly turning into an e-book version of Poundshop and my Kindle rapidly filling with interesting historical books, bought at bargain prices.

The latest is Robert Forczyk's Where the Iron Crosses Grow, covering the military operations in the Crimea from 1941 to 1944. This was not a campaign I am overly familiar with, but was intrigued by the programme on the 1942 battles in the Soviet Onslaught series. Given the fact I had just slapped some paint on my BTD WW2 Soviet Naval Infantry and ordered some Warlord ones to compliment them, this book being made available on Kindle for 99p was perfect.

I also bought Bill Yenne's The Imperial Japanese Army: The Invincible Years 1941-42, also available for the Kindle for 99p. Whilst my focus on the Far East will be the 1944-5 fighting in Burma, this book caught the eye as it contains details of Japanese paratroop operations and the battles against the Dutch which are normally lost in the coverage of the fall of Singapore and the Philippines.

Both should be interesting reads, I just need to find some free time now. Whilst I know many people still prefer "proper" books, it is worth noting that I saved £38.02 buying the e-books over the paper ones and that buys quite a few toys to play with...

Although a fan of science fiction, I no longer read as much of the genre as I did as a teenager when I almost literally devoured it. These days I prefer my SF at the cinema, on the TV or or the wargames table. That said I decided to give the much touted "return to old school space opera" Leviathan Wakes by James S A Corey (which SyFy are apparently going to make into a TV series).

A decent book, I really enjoyed it, the story mixing a police investigation plot line with another of the investigation of a mysterious SOS signal from a deserted ship. The story moves along swiftly and has a decent conclusion. Although marketed as book one of The Expanse series, you don't need to buy book two (or three) to find out what happens next.

The writing style is interesting with each chapter dedicated to a specific character and what is happening to them in the story but from a third person viewpoint. I thought this would be irritating but it works well. What I did like is the book's "universe". Whilst man has left Earth, he is still confined to the Solar System, populating Mars and various of the planets satellites, the politics between Earth, Mars and the Belters/Outer Rimmers is familiar enough, but there is enough SF to make it fun.

Overall, a decent SF novel, with some useful ideas for SF gamers. Onto book two now, Caliban's War...

I received a belated Christmas present last night(!) but it was well worth the wait. Haynes are best known for their series of books detailing the ins, outs and workings of cars which were indispensable back in the day (I remember using one to help change the shock absorbers on my Vauxhall Chevette in the late eighties) but in the past few years they have expanded the range to include things we are unlikely to be mechanically tinkering with, such as a Spitfire or the Death Star!

The Dan Dare: Spacefleet Operations Manual is a little different from previous volumes in that rather than looking at one particular machine it covers a whole range of them, many illustrated in the cutaway fashion so popular in the old Eagle comics.


It is a lovely book and anyone with any interest in Dan Dare will find much in it. As well as a large number of spaceships, the book also covers prominent characters and aliens from the stories, space bases, propulsion systems and a whole lot more. Great stuff...

Just a little progress on Watch Am Escargot today, making up and undercoating three Hotchkiss tanks and four Laffly trucks, so nothing to photograph, but kind Mr.Postman delivered a copy of Garth Ennis Presents - Battle Classics. As you probably know I grew up with Battle comic and love the wonderful Titan reprints (Charley's War, Major Eazy, Darkie's Mob, Johnny Red etc).

Garth Ennis Presents - Battle Classics is an anthology volume but in the main is a reprint of the excellent H.M.S. Nightshade story (192 pages of the 256), with the addition of the General Dies At Dawn and three short stories notable for the artwork by Cam Kennedy.

H.M.S. Nightshade is the story of a Royal Navy corvette, recounted by veteran George Dunn and is beautifully drawn by Mike Western (who also drew Darkie's Mob and The Sarge, two of my other favourites).

Naval stories never really work in comics, Battle had not had a good track record and even the naval stories in Charley's War had been stopped after the Falklands one, however, John Wagner and Mike Western clicked and for the year it ran, the gritty story of H.M.S. Nightshade was one of my favourites in Battle - I always harboured the dream of one day getting old of the Matchbox 1/76th Flower Class corvette kit and painting her as H.M.S. Nightshade!

It's great to read the story again, hopefully it won't be long before the Major Eazy North African campaign stories are released, and hopefully The Sarge.

As well as the historical fiction I have been reading on the Kindle, I have also been reading some factual tomes and am enjoying (albeit rather slowly) Tim Jeal's biography of Henry Morton Stanley. I have also picked up a few of the Osprey Raid series on Kindle, especially when they are being sold for under four quid. Recent purchases have included three WWII volumes...


I am most of the way through Knight's Move, a recounting of the 500th SS Parachute Battalion mission behind enemy lines parachuting on the Bosnian town of Dvavr on 25 May 1944 to kill or capture partisan leader Tito. I must confess to being totally unaware of this operation and am finding the book absolutely fascinating reading. I normally try to avoid wargaming with SS units, but some skirmishes based on the raid may be on the cards, it is perfect Bolt Action/Chain of Command material...

I've also picked up Red Christmas and The Fall of Eben Emael and hope they are as good as Knight's Move. The Raid series in itself is quite interesting and there are some fascinating looking volumes both already released and planned for 2014...

Real world work has seen me regularly sitting in cattle class on the train to and from London over the last month (with a trip to Birmingham to "enjoy" tomorrow). This has put a spanner in the painting works but has given me time to read quite a lot on my Kindle. January saw me catch up with the Anthony Riches Empire series which I had not realised I was a couple of books behind in. Whilst I bought the first three in paperback, I decided to switch over to electronic, if only for the fact that the author is planning 25 in the series and the Kindle version comes out six months before the paperback!


Over the last month I have read The Leopard's Sword, The Wolf's Gold and The Eagle's Vengeance, all of which I have thoroughly enjoyed and mused upon the wargming potential (I really must dig out those Warlord Roman Auxiliaries this year...). The books have seen the Tungrian auxiliaries adventures move to Germania Inferior then Dacia before returning to Britannia and ultimately Rome. Hugely entertaining I heartily recommend them...

Today saw another university recce, this time the University of Gloucestershire in very pleasant Cheltenham Spa, that is our investigations done, now Saul needs to get his personal statement written and his applications in.

Consequently that has meant little time for anything much else, though I have updated my Voyages Diabolique page with some new character types and tinkered with Saul's Bandcamp page (click if you fancy some rocking music).

I have however been reading an excellent book on the Fon and the Dahomey War in the form of Stanley B. Alpern's Amazons of Black Sparta. The title seemed a bit sensationalist but it is a very good academic work with lots of detail and information both on the Fon in the decades before the wars with the French and the wars themselves.

I'm about half way through but have learnt lots of interesting stuff and if you fancy dabbling in a more off beat colonial conflict that lasted considerably longer than the Zulu War then I recommend picking this book up (even if you don't fancy a dabble miniatures wise it still is a book well worth reading).

I've just finished Matthew Reilly's lastest novel Scarecrow and the Army of Thieves (or as the Americans call it Scarecrow Returns).  Sometimes you need a book that allows you to check your brain out and just be entertained and Reilly does that. He will not win a Booker Prize and the literati will turn their noses up at his efforts but I enjoy them.

If you are unfamiliar with his work he writes over-the-top Hollywood popcorn SFX heavy action movies as books. Each chapter ends with a cliffhanger, the villains are preposterous, the plots unbelievable, the heroes death-defying (well, most of the time) and there are lots and lots of explosions, stunts and gunfire.

Take the latest book, a renegade army of terrorists takes control of a secret Russian Arctic base and threatens to set the atmosphere on fire using a captured Soviet doomsday weapon*. Oh and the hero has just an hour to stop them!

Yes, they are silly, but they are entertainingly silly and that is all Reilly wants to do, entertain. He does in spades.

I'm not sure if the books would wargameable, I suppose 7TV would be the way to go as opposed to Force on Force, but you would have some great fun doing it.

If you haven't read a Scarecrow book start at the beginning with Ice Station. You don't need to have read the previous three books (and novella) but they are also great fun and they are referenced in the Army of Thieves...

* now that is what James Bond plots should have, not lost laptops!

The tenth and final volume of Titan's Charley's War reprints turned up today. A little sad that it is the conclusion but it does contain some of my favourite stories from my youth, starting in the summer of 1918 and the arrival of American troops through to the Russian Civil War (and a short depression era epilogue).

Joe Colquhoun's artwork of the battles against the Bolsheviks in Northern Russia is some of his best and the storyline revolving around the Red Colonel Spirondov's armoured train is quite exciting, although the conclusion is somewhat rushed.

I know many people look down their nose at "war comics" but Charley's War was something unique and special and has thoroughly deserved the excellent reprint treatment Titan have given it.

If you have any interest in the Great War I cannot do anything but recommend the series and suggest you try volume one. I will be truly surprised if Pat Mills story and Joe Colquhoun's artwork do not grab you, hook, line and sinker...

Back in the Eighties I was an avid reader of multi-book fantasy series and techno-thrillers, a bit of a strange mix to be sure. The latter included the likes of Tom Clancy, Harold Coyle and Larry Bond. Bond, as you may know, is also a wargamer and the author of the modern naval wargame Harpoon. 

It's Kraken, Gromit!

Recently I finished Leo McKinstry's Spitfire: Portrait of a Legend, I picked the Kindle version up cheap  a while back and had only just got around to reading if it. It is one of a trilogy of books by McKinstry on iconic British planes from WW2, the others cover the Hurricane and Lancaster.

I wasn't quite sure what to expect but was very impressed by a hugely readable and enjoyable book. McKinstry effectively splits the volume into three parts; the development and political background to the Spitfire, its role in the Battle of Britain and development and role after 1940.

The section on the development and the political infighting at the Air Ministry and Westminster was fascinating, Yes Minster buffoonery is tempered by the fact that it shows how fortunate we were that strong individuals ensured that not only did we have an air defence in 1940 (the bomber own air force concept was very popular) but shows that individuals lampooned by history such as Neville Chamberlain are owed a level of appreciation that they do not get. It was also interesting to note that Churchill favoured the Boulton Paul Defiant over the Spitfire!

The Battle of Britain features a lot of first hand accounts, including German ones, placed in the context of the battle as well as he performance of the aircraft. After 1940 McKinsty covers the development of the Spitfire through its various marks as the enemy threat alters, as well as service in the fighter sweeps over France, at Malta, D-Day and the Far East, before rounding off with an epilogue cover post-war use and action over Egypt, Malaya and Korea.

I was expecting that I would just dip into this book whilst reading others but once started found it hard to put down, it is that good. If you have any interest in air warfare or general military history it is certainly well worth reading even if you already have a basic knowledge of the subject.

I've been a bit under the weather today so I only managed a little bit of painting before "rain stopped play". My "Plane Month" research into Luftwaffe paint chips is not very inspiring and once I'd identified the Vallejo I need to buy I went off on a complete tangent and started re-reading the Ian Edginton and D'Israeli trilogy of graphic novels inspired by the War of the Worlds!

The first, Scarlet Traces, is a murder mystery set ten years after the Martian invasion in the War of the Worlds. The story is decent enough but what makes the volume interesting is the way that the British Empire has utilised Martian technology. There are tons of wonderful ideas including the Household Cavalry on mini-walkers for steampunk gamers.


They then produced a prequel in the form of an adaptation of H.G.Wells' novel, amusingly retro-fitting characters form Scarlet Traces into the background and maintaining a consistent look to the Martian tech. This can be read an an e-comic online here.


The final book of the three is Scarlet Traces: The Great Game which is set thirty years on from the original graphic novel during the counter-invasion of Mars with more of a Great War feel (though the spacecraft have a distinct Dan Dare feel). This concept would make for a really good wargame...


All are worth picking up and a nice break from Luftwaffe paint chips!