If you’ve been wondering why there haven’t been many book reviews appearing lately, the answer is quite simple. I have been far better at buying and reading books than I have been at actually writing about them. The “to be reviewed” pile has now reached the point where it is beginning to look less like a stack of books and more like a minor geological feature that has toppled over quite a few times already! If left much longer, I suspect it will require its own contour map.

So, over the next few weeks, the blog is going to have quite a few book reviews while I attempt to regain control of the situation. There will be military history, Australian history, frontier conflict, wargaming, memoirs, and probably a few books that have been sitting patiently on the review shelf wondering if I had forgotten they existed. I haven’t. I’ve simply been distracted by reading the next one before finishing the review of the previous one.

As always, these won’t be just star ratings or “I liked it” summaries. I’ll be looking at the quality of the research, the arguments the authors make, how well they support their conclusions, and, of course, whether the books are worth your time and money. With any luck I’ll reduce the backlog before I buy another armful of books… although history suggests that’s about as likely as leaving a bookshop empty handed.

As always thanks to ChatGPT for help with the image.