Guns Books

A military aircraft's armament is no less important then the aircraft it self, but it is a facet of aerial warfare often overlooked. Flying Guns of World War II does a very comprehensive job in covering the guns and cannons used by the combat aircraft of the second world war. And even though the book is very technically oriented it's readily accessible style of writing makes it a pleasant read. I fully recommend this book to anyone interested in the topic.

Anthony Williams and Emmanuel Gustin break important new ground with "Flying Guns of World War II." This book is the first comprehensive look at aircraft armament during the Second World War, an aspect that is more often than not neglected by aircraft historians. The book begins with a discussion of some of the conventions of aircraft armament and the basics of how most machine guns, cannons, and their ammunition work. It also discusses the history of aircraft armament from the end of World War I, including the development of rifle caliber machine guns, heavy machine guns, and cannons, with a focus on the World War II period.

The book offers a wealth of photographs, technical specifications, and charts. The appendices at the back include a lots of additional information including gun drawings, technical specifications, and a glossary of key terms.

The key drawback to this book is that the authors take a significant amount of space discussing the different World War II aircraft types, and the armament packages they carried. This is somewhat redundant, however, as this information can just as easily be found in any one of a number of other books on World War II aircraft. Perhaps the authors could have better used this space by going into the history of the guns themselves including who designed them and what differentiated guns of one model from another.

Nevertheless Williams and Gustin have produced an excellent book that should be required reading for World War II aviation buffs, and will hopefully spur much more writing and research into this field.

This book sets a standard that would be hard to beat. The authors know their subject and the production is superb. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in the field covered, and to others as an example of how a book should look.

The movies, from Tora, Tora, Tora; to the Battle of Britain; to Twelve O'Clock High pretty well tell the story. All kinds of fancy airplanes have been designed and built to get a gun pointed at the enemy.

World War II was fought with a set of airplanes that fit into a very small segment of time. The last biplanes were built about 1940, and the first jets about 1944. But World War II was fought (largely) with piston engined monoplanes armed with machine guns.

The British studies showed that they were primarily fighting unarmored aircraft that would be best attacked with rifle caliber machine gune. The Americans were in love with their .50 caliber machine guns. The Germans, faced with the problem of shooting down the heavily armed American bombers favored heavier cannon that could fire explosive shells.

This is the story of the guns used by the air forces fighting World War II. It includes the technical aspects as well as some of the theory, or perhaps politics is a better word, behind the thinking of the various air forces.

A unique work for the weapons affectionado.

" Human slavery is wrong, insecure, and demoralising. On mechanical slavery, on the slavery of the machine, the future of the world depends." That profound quote from Oscar Wilde leading off the robot section tells you that this is not simply another stylish, colour- drenched coffee table collector's book, but one which marries brief text and evocative photos to cast its subject in a new light. "This book celebrates the design, novelty and colour of these highly fascinating toys," the authors write, exactly the same elements that readers and collectors find so fascinating.

In 225 pages, they present hundreds of colour photos of rare and iconic robots and space toys, along with brief informative blurbs. A rare feature is a listing of manufacturers' marks, both fascinating and helpful in identifying toys. Another rarity is the many photos of original boxes, along with numerous colour and style variants. Amazon suggests you buy this book along with Blast Off! I'd make the same suggestion. Blast Off! has lots of reading, unusual in a collector's book, while the stunning photography and layout lift this British book well above the ordinary.

I have to agree with the comments made by the author himself, both " ...informative & visually stimulating ...". If that was what he set out to achieve by writing this excellent book, then he has surpassed it. Superb colour pictures of the type of tin robots & space toys we all played with in our younger days brought the memories flooding back. For collectors of this type of toy, this has to be a classic. Clear photography, excellent description of each toy, rare items and original boxes and a desirability guide. A must for both new & experienced collectors alike !

Altho I'm not a Space Toy collector, this will be on my shelf just for the quality and quantity of the fantastic vintage graphic images of the toys and their boxes.

For the Space Toy afficianado, this has the best, large scale, clearest photos I've seen. Thee is brief, but concise information on each toy that includes the size, maker, year, country, desirability, & description. There are several pages of trademark logos. It's a real trip down memory lane and should serve as one of the top ranked refrence books out there.

The authors have done a superb job in presenting a classic piece of collectible reference. The book is filled to the bubble with all the greats and done with taste and care. One of the nice sections is a complete listing of toy manufacturers trademarks. No effort was made to price the robots and space toys, which I'm gratefully thankful for, since any attempt would certainly have dated the work. As a collector this will be one of my future guides as I pursue what has become a rewarding if albeit expensive pastime! Bravo...and my compliments. To all others the least bit interested...get this book!

Anyone who has read the long standing Executioner series of men' action/adventure books has heard of Michael Newton. But who knew he could write such engrossing and entertaining westerns?

With the character of Matt Price he has struck gold, expecially humanly showing Matt to tired and weary of burying in double figures, less fast gunmen. All he has to show for a lifetime of gunfighting is his horse and nowhere in particular to go. So up comes another young gunny trying to make a rep and also comes a telegram prior to the fight from an old friend 10-years back. 'Come to Texas, need help' is pretty much what Belle has written. True to friendship and more, Matt heads out to Texas, several week's ride away. Stepping full force into a hornet's nest of greed, killing, and a past that just hasn't gone away.

As this book weaves way to an ending we begin to like and approve of Matt Price more and more. He has a son, Jesse, now that he never knew about, that very fact will change his life in this book as well as the others that follow.

I'm a late comer to these books of Lyle Brandt (Michael Newton) but have now purchased all, and have even read his 1st book in the new series, LAWMAN, too. 2nd LAWMAN due out soon. As long as Lyle Brandt/Michael Newton continues to write 'em, I'll be reading them.

Semper Fi.

Terrific book! Who'd believe a new modern Western could be this good?

Matt Price is the fastest gun alive.But a good smart moral man,trapped by his own speed and knowing what's ahead. In a dusty town after a blazing-fast reputation-hunting kid draws a little too slowly against him, Price gets a telegram.The woman he loved ten years before --who left him because she saw him gun down two men who came against him in the night--is in trouble.

Most modern Westerns are terrible. Bad Westerns and bad pornography.Matt Price is a stand-up guy. Ethical,troubled,thoughtful, gentle in his own way. And the best there is at what he does, when forced to it. A rousing tale..

get this one and the sequel--justice gun, and finish them in one sitting. this writer is better than others who just got more hypes and better marketing strategies but would not surpass this new upcoming and very promising writer. so far, only louis la'mour and a few others are actually readable in this genre. mr brandt will be definitely among these few. tks very much.

When I first started reading this book, I thought I was galloping straight into cliche-land. What saved the book for me was the characters. They were likable and fleshed out pretty well, so I cared about what was going to happen. The bad guy was suitably bad, and there's plenty of gun-fighting action. Ought to be, based on the title. I look forward to reading the next book in the series.

"A tremendously exciting read" Judge Sanford M. Brook

Patricia Williams, Acting Justice of N.Y. Supreme Court says about Gun Crazy: "I truly enjoyed Mr. Booker's writing. He knows the secret of making you want to actually visit the scenes he describes so well. . . Mr. Booker's book is different than others, because it deals with the many different aspects of a real trial. Hence, the characters are drawn with detail and care."

Warren Burnett said: "Superbly, writer Booker honors his craft in this story of a courtroom trimph made possible by the grit and grace of Kerrville's Scott Stehling, a true examply of the decent and talented lawyer."

Racehorse Haynes said: "A brutal senseless crime, a skilled trial lawyer's fight for Justice for a young man in the wrong place at the wrong time. A must read for all interested in trial by jury."

I purchased this for my husband, and he's ecstatic. Over the last month he's shown me every picture, and read me something from nearly every page. I can only assume he's pretty happy with it, since I can't pry it out of his hands!!

Excellent and comprehensive review of Sig Sauer pistols. Unfortunately does not include the new Sig R-DAK models with their unique and butter smooth trigger systems, recently adopted by the Coast Guard and some other more secretive Federal agencies.

Could stand an updated edition, but still well worth the money.

(I'm writing this after a quick first read-through of the book, so please forgive any error I may unintentionally inject.)

I'm a pretty solid "gun nut," with an excellent and diverse gun book library. I always feel ambivalent about these books that purport to give an overview of a gun company and its product line. While I'm interested in learning stuff that I don't already know (bring on the minutiae!), many of these books (those of one particular coffee table author come to mind) turn out to contain little more than a few beautiful photos with a ton of incredibly dull rah-rah copy: recitations of annual production numbers for various models are a highlight. However, Ayoob's GUN DIGEST BOOK OF SIG-SAUER is a good example of what can be done RIGHT with this type of book.

Ayoob, love him or hate him, is a major gunwriter for a reason. He can write (unlike some) and he's smart. One may disagree with some of his theories (I do, personally) and one may question whether he is right or has experience on a given legal or tactical issue, but the man knows how to write interesting articles about guns.

That's what he does here. The GUN DIGEST BOOK OF SIG-SAUER has a chapter for each model of Sig-Sauer's pistols, from the P-220 through the GSR 1911 (nothing on the new 250s, alas). Ayoob covers each model in detail (you'd think this would get boring with the overall similarity of the Sig-Sauer pistols, but it doesn't) offering insights as to each model's pluses and minuses, as well as intelligent commentary on the sociological niche each model fills. There are chapters on the Sig-Sauer in training, in competition, and on the various custom options available. There are chapters on SIG handguns like the P-210 and on the SIG-H?mmerli target series. There's a chapter on tactics featuring a bunch of goofy photos showing folks performing drawstroke techniques taught by Ayoob's LFI. It's an amazingly thorough book (the NH-based Ayoob's physical proximity to SIGARMS might have helped here): well-written and informative.

The book serves up hundreds of well-done photos to illuminate the text. They're not always placed right next to the text they're illminating, but that's okay. (They're not always of Ayoob, and that's great, too.) Ayoob provides photos of interesting points (e.g., comparisons between the stamped steel slide of a 220 and the milled steel slide of a 220 ST, old grip styles, comparisons of the short and long trigger styles) that fulfill the reason to have a book like this one. I know that Gun Digest books are usually full of good photos, but this one is better than most.

Because of the photos and the nicely delineated text, this is a book that one can read for a couple of hours or just pick up for a couple of minutes (I foresee a lot of copies camped out in the bathrooms of their new owners) to read an article or check out some different photos. Ayoob's writing on each topic is insightful and well-reasoned, and I learned a fair amount in my first run-through.

If you're a "gun nut" (or if you're shopping for one), I don't think you'll be disappointed with this book. Given my aforementioned ambivalence about these "overview" books, I thought long an hard before I bought this one. Now that I've read through it, however, I'm planning to buy another copy for a friend! (By the way, Amazon is offering a great price on the GUN DIGEST BOOK OF SIG-SAUER, which runs $28 at the retail outlets where I've seen it.) Ayoob did a great job with this one!

If you want to know about Sig products and how to effectively use them this is a great book. It is well written and covers basics to more advanced items. I really enjoyed it. Recommended.

My brother Steven loves to hunt and fish, so every year for his birthday I send him a book. Steven's review: "This is one of the best books I have ever read ..."

Southerns do have a lovely way of using language. Maybe there is a drop more compassion in the cool creek waters.

Good friends gave me this book when I graduated high school more years ago than I like to realize. I have read, re-read, and re-re-read it, and given a copy to my grandson in hopes of instilling in him some of my love of the outdoors.

The first time I read this book, and most of the subsequent times as well, I laughed until tears rolled down my face. Babcock eloquently paints word pictures of hunting and fishing experiences in the deep South of the early 20th century.

The reader will notice a much higher quality of writing than is commonly found in outdoor magazines today. Today, few college professors admit to such politically incorrect pastimes as hunting and fishing. The modern reader does need to remember the time frame in which these stories take place. Babcock was a product of his environment, and while he speaks fondly of Uncle Sessions and others eligible for membership in the NAACP, he doesn't use the politically correct terminology of today.

I have cherished and retold -- with attribution -- several stories contained in this book, and just remembering them can take 10 points off my blood pressure.

If you like to hunt and fish, or like someone who does, this book is an excellent choice.

A must for every gentleman bird hunter, fisherman, or dog owner/. Dr/. Babcock tells of his pursuit of Bob White, fishing for breem, and his fascination with as well as tribulations over bird dogs/. Humor permeates stories about the perfect quail gun, ownership of the near-perfect hunting dog, the secret weapon of breem fishing-- the catawba worm and the virtues of the old cross rail fences/

Havilah Babcock loved bird hunting in the south.

35 of his stories are a treasure of tales by a man who is genuine in his approach to hunting and fishing.

No matter how many times I reread his stories, he makes me feel I am there in the field beside him.

Good stuff. Informative, well illustrated and well written.

For those of us intrigued with seeing and understanding the interiors of places like aircraft gun positions, this book is both wonderful and disappointing. While there are some incredible modern photos and plenty of interesting archival information, illustrations and photos (the astonishingly complicated remote control gun system on the ME410, for example) I wanted the photographer to show me more. The book could easily have had twice the number of pages and gone into more detail on each aircraft. But as one reviewer has written, it's a coffee table book.

There are also a number of typos, even misplaced photo captions, but that seems to be a common problem in recent books. Have publishers cut out the copy editor position as a cost saving measure!?

Nevertheless, Gunner is a magnificent book that provides more information and photos and does so better than any other I've seen. It presents more than 20 aircraft from the US, Germany, UK, and Italy as well as an interesting section on the development of aerial gunnery in WWI.

Well worth adding to your collection, especially considering the reasonable price.

When I went through this book the first time I immediatly noticed a difference with other books of this genre. The amazing quality of the pictures in this book is stunning. Close up fotography is something special and the authors of this book have braught this up to a new level. They took pictures of planes that I've seen in real life as well and these pictures took me back to that moment. The anekdotes of World War 2 veterans make this book even more worthwile and in combination with a similar book (Cockpit) by the same authors this book is a must for airplane and World War 2 enthousiasts. Now you can try to imagine what it was like being a gunner on one of these airplanes, having only a few seconds or less to shoot down your enemy. I hope that there will be more books like these to follow because the quality is rare...

I have to agree with the previous reviewer - the quality of the photographs of gun stations and aircraft interiors (in modern day color!) is rare and truly gives the reader a different perspective. While not presenting exhaustive histories of the different airplanes featured - it is more a "coffee table" book than a technical reference - they authors have presented an enjoyable overview of the history, characteristics of the planes, fleshed out with personal anecdotes of the gunners who served. Many rare archival documents and photographs are also featured. A good companion volume to "Cockpit" (which I also own)

The book is really good as Thomas Geve describes meticulously the struggle ofr survival of an inmate at three different concentration camps and during the death march. In addition, you get a sense of what the inmates talked about amongst themselves, what the Jewish inmates thought about the Ukranians, what the Ukranians thought about the Gypsies etc. The most moving part of the book is the description of the letters he received from his mother and his last meeting with his mother within the confines of Aushwitz.
Also telling was how the inmates experienced the liberation. In any case, a must read to know how hell looks like from the inside.

This book was a very moving holocaust story about a 13 year-old-boy survivng the holocaust. The images were so vivid and so detailed, this book was wonderful. I reccommend it to all.

This book was a very moving holocaust story about a 13 year-old-boy survivng the holocaust. The images were so vivid and so detailed, this book was wonderful. I reccommend it to all.

This book will touch your heart and shock you at the same time! The young man survived to tell his story and an amazing story it is. I could not put this book down and was moved to tears at one point. The atrocites of the Holocaust have been well-documented and it is humbling to realize that most Germans thought of themselves as "modern, respectable" citizens while gassing, torturing, and executing Jews. A beautifully written, astonishing book!

I thought it was a great book, and have read it over and over, it goes into great depth in the making, and working sytems inside and out of the gun, from pistols to big infantry support weapons. It has illustrations of the inside workings and explains them in detail, but still understandbly. You will not be disapointed in this book.

I'd like to say first that this is an incredible book with a lot of information. I pnly have one problem with it which is very small,and other than it this book is essentially perfect. On the back cover and in the descriptive captions written for this book it is said that the Desert Eagle is included, however it is simply not in the book. An editing mistake I guess so no stars taken off but something to note.

I am a writer who needed a basic resource of combat weaponry for my library, and this was perfect. First of all, the book is full of color photography in a eye-catching graphical style. It features photos of the weapons being used in actual combat situations, as well as in simple field testing. Each weapon's brief history is discussed, a diagram of each is featured with the innards exposed to illustrate firing mechanisms, and many weapons have a step-by-step section on field stripping. For a neophyte, like myself, this book is a great introduction to combat weapons and I highly recommend it.

I thought it was a great book, and have read it over and over, it goes into great depth in the making, and working sytems inside and out of the gun, from pistols to big infantry support weapons. It has illustrations of the inside workings and explains them in detail, but still understandbly. You will not be disapointed in this book.

Seriously, if you want to learn how to play rock music, buy these books (volume 1 and 2) and practice learning the rhythms and leads and solos. It's challenging stuff for sure, but there's a wide variety of styles and such. I recommend learning all of Patience to start, then move on to harder songs. I learned so much from learning songs and parts of songs from this by striving to play it note for note. Theres a ton of guitar playing on all these songs so it should keep you occupied for a long time.

If your advanced and just want to learn GNR songs then its just as good. Everything is easy to read, the print size etc. is perfect and everything is accurate as far as I can tell. Get both of these books and you have the blueprints for learning to play rock music.

Slash is definately my favorite guitarist and to me there's none better when it comes to playing with heart and soul and technique to match. If youre serious about self teaching yourself rock guitar definately give these books a try, it will be very rewarding.

Includes songs like Break Down, Civil War, Don't Cry, Knocking on Heaven's door and more - just fun to play. A must have for all those who play the guitar or Guns n roses fans. Don't forget to buy volume 2. Doesn't have the songs from: 'The Spaghetti Incident?' though, maybe it's better this way because that album wasn't too good.

I love how every single song is in this two book set (Complete I and Complete II). It's very thorough and it has every signal note from every Slash solo. But, it is a bit advanced (for me too) and a lot of it is pretty complex. Good thick tab book though.

If you want to learn Guns N' Roses songs exactly how they were recorded, get this book!