| Sandinista | 30 Jan 2017 3:29 a.m. PST |
Has anyone read this book or know of any online reviews? Cheers
Ian |
Wackmole9  | 30 Jan 2017 7:13 a.m. PST |
Yes, I have read the book. A interesting take on dark age landscape survey archaeology. He is a retired British Army Major who has a good eye for topography. He makes a clear study of dikes and fortification and their effect on the advance of the Angle Saxons invaders. If you are interested in the era , I would suggest it. |
Nic Robson  | 30 Jan 2017 6:41 p.m. PST |
I agree with the above.
Not Arthurian as such, but an excellently documented read regarding the way geography shaped the wars following Roman Britons decline and the Viking invasions. Nic |
Oh Bugger  | 31 Jan 2017 3:18 a.m. PST |
I see the author got a good review from a certain E L Wisty on Amazon which is always a good sign when looking at Books with Arthur in the title. My copy is now on its way. |
| Hobhood4 | 31 Jan 2017 4:01 p.m. PST |
This post got me interested. Read the introduction on Amazon and ordered it straight away on Kindle. So far – 2 chapters is – a remarkably clear headed approach to the issues of the Saxon conquest which takes modern scholarship into consideration, albeit skeptically. Looking forward to the rest. |
| Oh Bugger | 05 Feb 2017 4:24 a.m. PST |
I'm a few chapters into this now. Very good stuff about the strategic implications of defensive works, and some good insights all round. But, and its a big but the book really needed a good editor, Jim Storr gets some of the simple historical detail wrong and had he been pointed towards some of the work of Koch and Charles-Edwards he would have produced an even better book. As it is this is still a book very much worth reading for anyone interested in the period. |
| Whirlwind | 25 Sep 2017 5:55 a.m. PST |
I really enjoyed this one, thought it very interesting. One amazingly useful part is that he really details what the various areas of Britain were probably like at the time, as in which areas were wooded, which areas were marsh, where watercourses were different and so on. Allied to the locations of the earthworks and the broad sweep of the military events, I would really recommend it to anyone looking at doing a "Dark Ages" campaign set in Britain. Oh, and he proposes a much later date for the disappearance of late Roman units from Britain. |
| Whirlwind | 25 Sep 2017 6:02 a.m. PST |
And only £2.25 GBP on Kindle at the minute! link |
| Hobhood4 | 25 Sep 2017 2:36 p.m. PST |
Didn't like this in the end. Verged into psuedo history, with loads of unfounded suppositions and selective use of evidence. The topographical information is exhaustive and seems very well researched, but the conclusions are for some reason presented as fact rather than the suppositions that they can only be. |
| Whirlwind | 26 Sep 2017 1:20 a.m. PST |
but the conclusions are for some reason presented as fact rather than the suppositions that they can only be. I thought the author had said early on that basically everything that follows is tentative? I mean, do you think that even given that, it was too speculative; or that the style makes the reader think the author is being more definite than he means to be? (Hopefully that makes sense!) |
| Hobhood4 | 28 Sep 2017 10:03 a.m. PST |
Whirlwind It may be a style issue, but for a book that was presented as a proper piece of scholarship it was slapdash, good ideas notwithstanding. My Amazon reviews and further comments are here:
'Intriguing new ideas mixed with speculative pseudo history'.
link The author has subsequently deleted his indignant responses. |
| Whirlwind | 30 Sep 2017 5:06 a.m. PST |
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