What are you currently reading ?

[Chris Pringle]

Finally reading "Kennesaw Mountain" by Earl J. Hess. This was a generous gift from my good friend Konstantinos Travlos when we met up at the said ACW battlefield a couple of years ago:
https://bloodybigbattles.blogspot.com/2024/12/acw-battlefields-between-nashville-and.html

At last I am getting round to writing a scenario for this major battle, which means doing the reading for it. Hess's book is very detailed and very helpful.

[kipt]

Finished Vol. 90, No. 1 of "The Journal of Military History".
Articles include:

Ferdinand Foch and the Operational Level of War, Part 1: "Scientific" Battle and Operational Effectiveness on the Industrialized Battlefield,
Lieutenant Colonel Faraman's War: attache Intelligence and the Polish-Soviet Conflict, 1919-1921,
Bottleneck: The Supply of Liquid Oxygen for the German V-2 Rocket,
Revisiting the Nazi-Fascist Military Alliance: Italo-German Rivalry and Cooperation during the Mediterranean War, 1940-1943,

plus others as well as 90 pages of book reviews and lists of magazine articles.

[fsn]

I've dug out my stack of the "Journal of the Traveller's Aid Society" - the Traveller magazine.



Really odd to read magazines citing the Soviet Union as a going concern.

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Really odd to read magazines citing the Soviet Union as a going concern.

So does Blade Runner!

[fsn]

I think you wittingly or unwittingly misunderstand. I was reading the JTAS number 20, from 1984. I bought that volume 42 years ago - probably when I was at uni in Sheffield studying Applied Statistics, or maybe when I had moved to my first real job in London working as a programmer for a MoD contractor. . I was unmarried - somewhere between fiancees 1 and 2.

This little book and its companions have travelled with me through a marriage, a divorce, the birth of a child and her marriage, a career guided by happenstance to be the training manager for a reasonably large charity. I have moved house 5 or 6 times, and been in intensive care twice.

My brother died some 15 years after I bought the book; both my parents have died since I bought it. I have had very good times and very poor times.

I sold my rather large collection of RPGs, sold my rather large collection of comics, thrown out all my wargaming figures and started again. Throughout, this little book has waited patiently for me to pick it up so it could transport me back 42 years and restore a little bit of wonder.

I haven't looked at the JTAS for many, many years. I didn't realise how long until the phrase "the particle accelerator is being developed by both the Soviet Union and the United States" struck an chord.

[pierre the shy]

That's an interesting story fsn. If your JTAS collection has been with you for 42 years then it deserves another look. Who knows what pearls of wisdom and inspiration they may contain, even if they are Traveller RPG related ones rather than about life, the universe and everything 

My mother had first edition bound copies of both The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. I first read them in the early 1970's, well before they became popular. I really loved the tales, and asked if I could have them eventually and she was happy to see them go to me when she no longer had need of them. Then Tolkien fever struck NZ in the early 2000's and she decided to sell them for a fairly hefty sum.

I have copies of Tolkien's works which I still read, but they are not quite the same as having the originals.

Don't think I could afford to get another first edition set         

[Steve J]

The Crusdades by Thomas Asbridge. Just started, but very well written and good that it looks at the period from the Muslim point of view too.

[fsn]

That's an interesting story fsn. If your JTAS collection has been with you for 42 years then it deserves another look. Who knows what pearls of wisdom and inspiration they may contain, even if they are Traveller RPG related ones rather than about life, the universe and everything 

They've been a little gateway to my past.

My mother had first edition bound copies of both The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. I first read them in the early 1970's, well before they became popular. I really loved the tales, and asked if I could have them eventually and she was happy to see them go to me when she no longer had need of them. Then Tolkien fever struck NZ in the early 2000's and she decided to sell them for a fairly hefty sum.

Ouch!

[kipt]

Finished "Full Duty: Vermont in the Civil War" by Howard Coffin.  A small state Vermont responded immediately in the call for soldiers.  Ultimately Vermont provided 1 cavalry regiment, a heavy artillery regiment, which became the 11th Vermont Infantry, 3 artillery batteries, two sharpshooter companies and 11 other infantry regiments. Vermont's population at the start of the civil war was 315,098 and furnished 34,238 men of which 5224 died; per capita Vermont was only second to Michigan.

The First Vermont Brigade was known for excellence in battle, gathering praise from Sheridan in his Valley campaign.  The second Brigade was instrumental at Gettysburg as they marched forward on the right flank of Picket's charge and flanked the Confederates.

The book is full of first person accounts and good descriptions of army life throughout the war.

Recommended.