Current Reading: May 2023

First up I see. Knocked off Exit Rommel. What would have been a so-so work when fresh and is now mostly obsolete, though the author does have some interesting thoughts on the Rommel phenomenon.

Currently going very slowly through Fighters Over the Fleet: Naval Air Defence from Biplanes to the Cold War by Norman Friedman. This is a bit different than the usual Friedman book that concentrates on hardware; this book gives equal time to theory, doctrine, procedures and practices. But it is very much a Friedman book in that the Kindle version (which I got on deep sale, happily) is almost 1400 pages. It's slow going but I'm really learning quite a lot.

Speaking of fighters and naval aviation, I finished up Vought F-8 Crusader, which is very "nuts-and-bolts" oriented, even by the standards of the Specialty Press. It's great for what it is, but it would have been nice to have a little more documentation of what the designers thought of their creation.

Finished Henry VIII's Military Revolution, which makes a good argument for there being more to English military effectiveness in the early 16th-century than first meets the eye. However, this is a fairly narrow monograph, and author is going to assume that you're well aware of the international state of play at the time, and whole argument that there was a "military revolution" in Early Modern Europe.

Wrapping up the month with The War of Jenkins' Ear, a popular treatment of a conflict with a strong Colonial American angle, though Gaudi undercuts himself by being too snide at points.

>5 Shrike58: I read your review over on the book's LT page. I have some interest in the subject, but it seems a shame that the author falls into a "wise-guy tone". Still, I'll put it on my various wishlists.

>6 jztemple: When you don't know a lot, anything is an advance, but I'm now looking for more sophisticated takes on the topic. Any minute now Helion should publish a new book on the topic!