Games Day 2010

There was an interesting programme on the BBC the other day looking at various less well known stories around the Battle of Britain. At one stage they debated the merits of the Spitfire versus the Me109 with surviving pilots, concluding the latter was just about faster. Well, all I know is that the Peugoet 407 is much faster than a Spit' as we took this one on the M5 this morning on the way to Birmingham, no problem! :-) Seriously, it was an unusual sight with the wings following in a second vehicle. I don't think it really is a Spitfire but the 1/1 scale "Airfix model' James May made in his programme on Airfix as the wings looked like the ones with the emergency steel support pipe in, still it was fun coming up behind it and firing the Peugoet's cannon! (I know I should grow up...)

Anyway we arrived at the NEC about 10.10am and walked straight in, no queue, which was a pleasant surprise. The LG Arena was extremely crowded initially, especially the Forgeworld stand, so we moved into the other hall to look at the various studio exhibits (and THQ area for Saul who loves Dawn of War). This area was well lit and apart from the scrum around the new Dark Eldar (photos on TGN for those interested - the raiders are very Martian sky galleon kite now) easy to get around and to see the two huge WHFB displays, one from the new rulebook, one (the Sea of Blood) from his months WD. Incredibly impressive, photos do not do them justice, you could have spent hours looking at all the detail.

Back to the LG Arena I was distinctly underwhelmed first by the abysmal lighting and then by the "samesness" of many of the games. There were too many Elves v Skaven, almost all were on the GW terrain boards and even the 40K games suffered from too many Ork games (I didn't see one Necron...). That said there were some gems, two good Empire v Undead WHFB games and one with two floating wizards towers. There was a big Aeronautica Imperialis using 28mm scale Forgeworld planes instead of 1/300th (this was the only non-GW trinity game and there were only a couple of LOTR). For those interested I have run my photos through iMovie and uploaded them to You Tube (due to the lighting and the lack of variety, sadly only half as many as last year).

Another disappointment was the lack of any Warhammer Historical games, but Forgeworld did offer the launch of Warhammer Forge, their new fantasy arm and WHFB gamers will now be pleased to see they are receiving the same (expensive) love as 40K gamers from the resin model makers. I've uploaded the photos I took of the forthcoming models for the soon to be released Tamurkhan: The Throne of Chaos sourcebook onto the SFSFW blog. The models did look tempting, especially the Chaos Dwarf machinery (and I've never really liked Chaos Dwarves...)

That though was about it, ok, but not a patch on last year. By 1.30pm we were talking to the blokes who design the boxes for the figures so we decided to grab a pasty and call it a day. We did have a quick look at the Black Library books on the way out. Dead Men Walking (Death Korp v Necrons) and The Emperor's Finest (new Ciaphas Cain) were available pre-release (both due December) but even Saul isn't that much of a fanboy to pay £7.99 for a paperback that Amazon will have at a much cheaper pre-release price...).

Forward The Red Army!

Bit of a Red Army theme in this post, although I have also almost finished a fairy for SWMBO, scratch-built a 2mm North-West European village from sprue for the "secret" VSF project and just cleaned up some nice new (as yet unreleased) land ironclad masters Tony from Brigade sent me.

More of this another day, today I have finished some more of the wonderful 28mm Plastic Soldier Company Russians I bought at Colours including some conversions I attempted...

First off are these two riflemen and smg'er. The smg pose is a little awkward in that he is holding the barrel but this is because he shares a common body with a rifleman which dictates the pose somewhat.

Next is the nurse many are moaning about (use your imaginations chaps), an officer kneeling and pointing and an uninspiring figure I've now concluded is the no. 2 to go with the walking lmger I painted earlier.

As these were plastic (and cheap) I couldn't resist attempting some conversions. The standing pointing officer had his arms replaced with the "holding smg" pair to make an NKVD Internal Security officer. His original pointing arm was stuck to the "useless" grenade thrower I didn't like to make a useful NCO and an lmg was stolen from a prone lmg team to have a soldier firing dramatically from the hip!

The prone trooper sans lmg was quickly converted into a casualty with one of the separate heads provided on the sprue and a quick arm and leg amputation and reposition of another of the "useless" grenade throwers gave me another casualty figure.

I painted up one prone lmg team as they are very nice but have yet to decide on how to base them as they don't fit on a 40mm base.

Finally in a fit of Sovietness I dipped and based a couple of old 20mm Hotspur troopers from their 1980's Afghanistan range. I have no idea who (if anyone) produces these now, but they are very nice figures and I must try and find the rest I bought back in the eighties (this also gave me a chance to try of the Dead Grass flock the idiot in GW Cribbs Causeway said they didn't sell!)

Off to Games Day tomorrow with Saul (and credit card) then a bit of working away so there'll be little chance to get much more done for a few days, but at least I might get a chance to finish reading Road of Bones...

The Shadow Over Innsmouth

Back in July I mentioned that I'd picked up a copy of Strange Aeons and with it a couple of Uncle Mike's resin Deep Ones. I painted them up pretty quickly at the time but never quite finished the bases until the other day when I remembered them so here they are. A pretty minimalist approach to the painting but I'm happy enough with them (though I may put a green wash over the grey/black to give the clothing a more damp look).

The workbench is currently covered in "dipped" Russkis drying. I've painted up some more of the Plastic Soldier figures and had a go at converting a few so hopefully I'll be able to post photos of these by the end of the week. The conversions have turned out pretty good which is pleasing as I wasn't sure how versatile the largely one piece castings would be for converting.

Going forward though I need to refocus on some 2mm scenery for a (currently) top secret VSF mini-project and my 6mm WWI if I am to get Elan reissued on time.

Damme Fer A Marlinspike Else!

To celebrate International Talk Like A Pirate Day I found this wonderful fan made (and rather wacky) video for Pirate Metal band Alestorm's Over The Seas...

For the more literary minded amongst you I recommend seeking out George MacDonald Fraser's The Pyrates, a very funny pirate novel by the master storyteller of the Flashman papers.

On an unrelated note, according to the local Craft Shop it was International Cup Cake Week last week, now how stupid is that! ;-)

For The Motherland!

With a busy work schedule looming I was determined to get some more painting done before I sample the delights of Athens, Montpellier and Ipswich over the next few weeks...

Following a couple of comments on the blog about the Plastic Soldier 28mm Russians I decided to paint a few up. Whilst there are nineteen different figures in the box I have only painted up ten so far.

I'll get the negatives out of the way first...

i) Opening the box they look rather soft on the detail front. the slightly shiny grey plastic is to blame as they paint up ok (not Bolt Action white metal standard I agree, but they are more than acceptable).

ii) The box says there are 6 junior offices/NCO's, 45 riflemen/smg's and 6 lmgs with loaders - there aren't. There are only 36 rifle/smg as nine figures (three lmg loaders and six others are unarmed - okay three of these have holstered pistols but that would mean nine officers...). It would have been nice for some separate weapons to be included on the sprue to convert these figures.

iii) Some figures had small pits and holes in the small of the back that needed filling.

iv) The soldier throwing the grenade is pants and to my mind not worth painting (his right arm looks far too short).

v) I'm no expert on Soviet webbing but rather a lot seem to be sporting the 1940 period meshok rucksack and webbing.

Ok, so that's what is wrong with them but I don't really care...

Converting plastics is not beyond me, I might even fit out some with captured German weapons. I'm used to filling metal figures so this was no chore and took minutes. The grenade thrower will probably become a casualty and I'm nowhere near anal enough to worry about rucksack webbing on a toy soldier which is painted in a slightly lighter khaki than then khaki blouse its on especially when viewed from three foot above. Above all they are excellent value at around 32p a figure.

For speed I block painted and dipped the figures in Army Painter Strong Tone. I think they've come out well enough, dipping certainly shows the detail that cannot be seen very well on the unpainted plastic.

Overall, whilst they are not perfect, they are to my mind more than acceptable and a quick, cheap and effective way of quickly getting a Soviet horde on the tabletop. All I need now is the support weapons pack to be released pdq to help thwart the fascist invader...

WW2 Grubs

One of the things that caught Saul's eye on Saturday at Colours (when he wasn't shoving Victorian Evil henchmen into my hands) was the range of WW2 Grubs from Ironclad Miniatures.

Not being an expert in this area I cannot say whether they are grubs or worms (they do remind me of the old PSOne game) but they are quite cute in a strange way, so whilst he was failing to Catch The Pigeon (beaten by a five year old girl - ouch!) I snuck back and bought two of the four packs available for his birthday...

I bought one each of the "German" and "Ruski" packs and smuggled them home and onto the workbench pdq. With only two days to his birthday (and SWMBO insisting I go into the garden and start building her pergola - where is the rain when you want it?) painting was going to be a bit of a rush job, so I decided to go with the Army Painter dip doing the block painting Sunday lunchtime, the dipping in the evening and then the basing and varnishing last night.

I'm quite pleased with the end result. I probably could have done better with my usual style of painting but in all probability they would probably still been in their blisters or just based and undercoated so all things considered I'm happy enough - and so was Saul this morning which is the main thing. Now I've just got to find some rules...

Dwarf Slayers of Karak-Zaul

Saul's birthday today and amongst his presents was this unit of twelve Dwarf Slayers I painted up for his WHFB army. I must confess that when GW first introduced the orange mohicaned beserkers into the Warhammer mythos I was not overly enamored. Indeed, along with chaos spikey bits and comic trolls, to me, they symbolised all that was wrong with the silly fantasy genre GW were creating. However whilst I still dislike chaos spikey bits and comic trolls, I have come to like the slayers.

The primary driver to this change of heart was the Gotrek and Felix books by William King which gave some useful insight into the slayer mentality and subsequently the Storm of Chaos campaign sourcebook (one of GW's best IMHO) with its Slayer Army of Karak Kadrin.

I'm not sure if we will go down the Slayer Army route (though that Goblin-Hewer looks fun...) but painting the models was very relaxing, working with a quite minimal palette. Hopefully they'll see some game time soon and carve huge holes in the enemy ranks!

Colours 2010

Saul and I toddled up the M4 to Colours on Saturday. Unfortunately I wasn't feeling too hot (well actually I was feeling too hot!) so we cut our visit short but we did manage to check out the games, Saul play Mutley in Chase The Pigeon and buy a few things (well I did, Saul showed remarkable restraint - or was he saving his money for Games Day?)

There were a lot of interesting games with a number that caught the eye (some like the Battle of the Bulge seen at Salute). I have created the traditional IronCow TV video with my photos which you can watch on YouTube, but I was especially taken with the late C17th Tangiers game (an unusual subject well executed), the Ork-a-Nawa Epic 40K game (a 26ft x 6ft and parallel 26ft x 3ft table of an Ork invasion - some great scratch built ships and ideas to do with the pile of old ships in the loft), The Yangtze Incident, Catch The Pigeon and the Lost World amongst many. One thing I have noticed of late though is games using 15mm or smaller miniatures, really do need quantity as they lose impact with similar size units to 28mm games).

Toys wise I went with a plan and for the most part stuck to it. I picked up some 1:285th Brits for my England Prevails project, the GZG Spider Mechs I missed out of at Salute to use in Iron Cow (and some hover drones Saul persuaded me to buy for his Terminator army as they are similar to the ones in T: 3D at Universal Studios in Florida). I also bought a box of the Plastic Soldier 28mm hard plastic Russians which are great value and look a lot better with an undercoat on as well as a couple of HaT SdKfz 251/1's for Saul's 20mm Germans and some Empress Zulu War British heads in pith helmets (to use on some old GW Praetorians so they fit in better with the Empress figures). I resisted the new Perry Sudan book and the Warlord/Bolt Action plastic Germans but did weaken and buy some more Ironclad Victorian figures and something else from Ironclad for Saul's birthday tomorrow that is currently drying on the workbench...

Overall a good show and I wish I could have spent a bit longer at it, especially some of the games which looked a lot of fun.

Ford O' Kabul River

Looking for an odd figure to complete a unit of figures I working on for Saul I stumbled across a 99% completed unit of 20mm (very) old Pax Britannica Colonial British for my (very) long ago planned North West Frontier project. Painted in enamels and on cardboard bases they looked very flat, so in a fit of enthusiasm I slopped on a bit of Army Painter dip on, finished the bases and et voila!

The figures were produced in the mid-80's and are very nicely detailed. The range became one of those enduring mysteries of wargaming as it moved across the pond (and possibly back and then back again) but I believe they are now produced by an American company called the Dayton Painting Consortium.

Unfortunately the unit, clearly one being raised for The Sword and The Flame is one man short. I hazard a guess I pulled one infantryman to convert to a standard bearer but I'm buggered if I know what became of him after 20 odd years.

Now I just need to paint up the Jacklex stuff SWMBO bought for my birthday, find the Pathans I bought back in the eighties and "blow the bugle, draw the sword!".

The Death Match

The great Bill Shankly once said that "football is not a matter of life or death; it's much more important than that."

Tonight England are playing the first match of the European Championship Qualifiers but I just can't be bothered to watch it. Shankly's quote however reminded me of a book I read a few years back about the legendary "Death Match" in Kiev and the incredible bravery exhibited by a group of Ukranian footballers in the face of Nazi intimidation.

The story inspired the semi-classic film Escape To Victory, but enjoyable though that film was the true story is much more inspiring and ultimately saddening. If you get a chance to read Dynamo: Triumph and Tragedy in Nazi Occupied Kiev by Andy Dougan please do. Even if you are not a football fan you will find the actions of these brave players uplifting and see that Bill Shankly did know what he was talking about, even if it was only to the people of Kiev.

'Ere's To You Fuzzy-Wuzzy

David Manley kindly invited me around for a game of his fledgling Sudan rules (Don't Throw, Bloody Spears, At Me!) tonight. Fast play simple rules they worked really well using a random card based move sequence (that almost worked in my favour in the end game) which gave a very good period feel.

I took the role of the "pore benighted" Madhists against the pride of the British Empire and decided to dispense with convoluted tactics advancing to contact as quickly as possible. Unfortunately one fuzzy-wuzzy unit seemed very reluctant to enter battle and kept rolling half movement for most of the game!

Contact was made on both flanks quite quickly. On the left DM's cavalry squadrons took out half my camel unit but came unstuck against a heroic band of fuzzy-wuzzys who managed to destroy both squadrons (the Madhist cannon picking off the sole survivor at long range with a lucky die roll). Unfortunately on the right my cavalry disintergrated after one volley from the Naval Brigade.

The card based activation system dictates whose move it is and I managed two simultaneous moves before DM pulled the Joker ending the turn without the British moving. I then pulled another black card so had a third move whilst all the British could do is defensive fire.

This run on the cards allowed me to seize the initiative and I managed to overrun and destroy one British infantry regiment, who had formed square after my surviving camels got behind the British line, however I did not quite have enough to break the second British regiment before DM managed to pull a card allowing the British to move again. The Naval Brigade swung into action and in a volley of Martini and cannon fire the Madhist centre was ripped apart with the Madhi himself dying as DM ordered rapid fire!

Overall an enjoyable game and it had a wonderful colonial feel with the plucky Brits managing to stand firm and grab victory at the end despite the breaking of one square and the incompetent behaviour of their cavalry.

So 'ere's ~to~ you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, at your 'ome in the Soudan;

You're a pore benighted 'eathen but a first-class fightin' man;

An' 'ere's ~to~ you, Fuzzy-Wuzzy, with your 'ayrick 'ead of 'air --

You big black boundin' beggar -- for you broke a British square!

Victorian Gothic

Whilst painting up presents for son and heir I try and make sure I have something else on the go to explain away the hours locked away in the games room. So, in between painting some odds and sods for a forthcoming birthday (15! Where does the time go?) I took the opportunity to paint up some Victorian characters I picked up at Salute last year.

I have for some time fancied playing some Victorian horror games but have never got around to it. I even drew up plans for a conversion of Voyages Extraordinares which would have been called Victorian Gothic and had Bill Thornhill sculpt some armed bobbies (as at that time no one did armed Victorian police).

The idea has resurfaced in my head whilst reading the Pax Britannia books from Abaddon and they inspired me to dig out and paint the Holmes and Watson characters I purchased off Ironclad Miniatures last year. These are lovely sculpts and based on the actors who played the characters in the Jeremy Brett series.

Holmes was something of a challenge as the photos of Brett in this costume show it to be all black. Luckily I'd picked up a tip off the web recently about mixing Kommando Khaki into black to lighten it but keep it "warm" and I think this has worked well. The Watson character is painted in a light brown/beige outfit similar to one in the TV series (both should be wearing gloves but I liked the bare flesh contrast). The excellent bases are from Fenris Games and really help set the figures off without detracting from them.

I also painted up three Victorian police to go with them. There are four in the Wessex Games set but for some reason I was short the shotgun armed constable in this particular set. As with Holmes and Watson I removed the intergral bases and fixed them to Fenris resin ones.

Painting sources proved a bit of a bind (which IIRC was the case when I painted my first set a few years back) and I am not 100% sure whether to paint the white stripes on the left cuff (it either donates they are on duty, or on traffic duty...). Whatever, I was pleased with how they came out so quickly and they fit in nicely with the Ironcald figures. All I need now is a Spring Heel'd Jack and we're away...

A Coward's Tale

My WWI plane building has come to a bit of a halt due to my inability to be anything like organised. Having run out of white undercoat I decided to buy some from the local (RC) model shop rather than drive into town. Wallet £10 lighter I ended up with a can that gave a very rough finish. Ok for tanks but not for 1/144th planes, 28mm soldiers or SWMBO's garden pixies she now wants me to paint (!) Picking up a can of GW spray yesterday (wallet another £8 lighter) I sat down last night to find I was pretty mcu out of the brass rod I use for plane struts (and as I want to do a Voisin next I am going to need a fair bit). I have managed to paint some test pieces for the Grande War in Hyboria project, have started on some Victoriania figures (Holmes, Watson and some police) and need to paint something up for Saul's birthday in a couple of weeks (probably something small and stunty).

The main reason for the post is to tell you about the latest book I've read, James Delingpole's Coward At The Bridge. I'd read the first in the series, Coward On The Beach, about D-Day, earlier in the year and quite enjoyed it but the second book, set around Market Garden is to my mind much superior and enjoyable. The books have been described as a WW2 Flashman which isn't correct, Dick Coward is not a cad and a coward, just very unfortunate despite his often brave unrecognised actions (or his badly misinterpreted ones). A bit 'Boys Own' in parts but enough realism and recognition that war isn't a game to balance, I'm certainly looking forward to the forthcoming Coward In The Woods and the other promised seven (which I hope includes Coward's adventures on the Eastern Front serving with the Germans!)

Terry Wise - My Wargames Hero

I've just read on TMP the sad news that Terry Wise passed away on the 17th of this month and his funeral is tomorrow. Like many wargamers of a certain age Terry Wise will have been one of the "wise men" of wargaming in their formative years, indeed for me, if it had not been for Terry, I may not have discovered wargaming and a hobby that has formed such a major part of my life.

I was for much of my youth an avid collector plastic kits (mainly tanks) and HO/OO Airfix soldiers and whilst I "played" with them (well created huge temporary dioramas) in my bedroom it was Terry's Observation Post column in Military Modelling that introduced me to the concept of playing 'proper' games with them when it took over Battle For Wargamers in 1977.

I loved this column and his inspiring wargames articles (I still want to make an Atlantic Wall games table from one article he wrote in an Airfix annual...). He was my wargames hero and he will be missed.

The Grande Age of Hyboria

The HaT Napoleonic figures I ordered have turned up and I am quite taken with them. They are a bit slender but are reasonably well detailed and look the part. Consequently (and despite other projects) I am going to launch a C19th imagi-nation project set in Hyboria.

This will probably be a slow burner but might help me get back on track with the 10mm Conan army as well. As part of the project I've created a new blog, The Grande Age of Hyboria, which, if you are interested, I hope you will join.

Never In The Field Of Human Conflict...

Lest we forget...

The Naga Queen

Yesterday was the 65th anniversary of VJ-Day and coincidentally I spent a good part of the evening "googling" an intriguing story from the Burma campaign.

Ursula Graham Bower was a 30 year old former debutante who led a group of Naga headhunters as a Captain in V Force during WW2 despite having no formal military training. Her story is quite amazing (as is much of V Force's) and she became so well respected she was given command of a Gurkha unit as well as Assam Rifles troops and other Nepalese soldiers in addition to her ill-armed Naga (the Americans loved he so much they wrote a comic book about her!)

Aside from this article from the Daily Mail, I also found a site with nearly 700 photos she took of the Naga and their homeland which are very interesting even if only a few are of a military subject matter.

Her book The Naga Path (published 1950) seems to be worth hunting down to find out more and 'Bower Force', as her unit was called, would certainly make an interesting and unusual WW2 unit.

Hansa-Brandenburg W.29

Also finished last night, my Reviresco Hansa-Brandenburg W.29, which as you can see presented quite a challenge painting wise due to the rather complex Imperial German Navy camo pattern, which makes the Luftstreitkräfte's lozenge schemes positively pedestrian... Ok, I didn't paint the pattern, the upper surfaces are decals from Reviresco which presented a challenge all of their own but I think we can all agree looks pretty darn good.

The Hansa-Brandenburg W.29 was a late war mono-seaplane fighter that saw service over the North Sea and one I could not resist when I saw the Reviresco model. The floatplane assembly was a bit tricky and I only used brass rod on the outer struts, using the white metal ones provided for the ones between the floats.

Reviresco provide all over decals for a number of their models including this, but I was somewhat perplexed on how to achieve a good result wrapping a decal around the fuselage etc, so in the end I painted the model a kind of sea-grey and cut the patterned parts of the decal sheet off and used them separately over a white background (unlike Dom's Decals, these do not have any white and must be used over a white undercoat. The crosses on the side of the model are from Dom.

Overall, really pleased with the end result and currently this is my favourite of my AirWar: 1918 collection. Next, after the AEG, possibly French or Italians...

Junkers D.I

A bit of decal frenzy last night saw me complete the Reviresco Junkers D.I, the first all metal fighter plane to enter service in 1918. The Junkers apparently lacked the maneuverability to be a frontline fighter in 1918 so was passed to the Navy and the 12 produced were deployed the Eastern Front following the 1918 armistice. Whilst it had limited use in WWI, it is such a nice looking design that it would make a great fighter for Inter-War imagi-nation wars if one was so inclined.

The Reviresco model is another nice one and was easy to put together. I couldn't find a lot of information on the correct camo scheme so have followed the pattern used by a number of aircraft modelers after a bout of Google-fu. Optionally I could have gone for an all-metal finish but as I haven't cracked the skill of painting (and varnishing) all metal finishes to my satisfaction I went with the green/purple look.

The decals are the ever fantastic Dom's Decals. Unfortunately Dom is between printers and the 1/144th range is temporarily out of stock, but luckily Dom still had one sheet of the later war German crosses left so I could finish the model.

Ghosts Of World War Two

You may have seen these before but I've just come across these very clever and evocative merges of WW2 photos into contemporary shots of the same locations. Just stunning...

Imagi-Nations

Like many gamers of a certain age I've always had a soft spot for the imaginary C18th wars played out by the likes of Charles Grant, but never have taken the plunge mainly due to cost. The new plastic releases from the likes of Victrix and Perry's make a C19th black powder imaginary war possible, but I have been quite taken by HaT's 28mm hard plastic releases. They are more slender compared to the other companies 'wargames standards' but to my mind that gives them a kind of Stadden/old toy soldier look (and they can paint up nice as shown by this photo from their website).

Whilst the Victrix and Perry plastics are very good value for money, the HaT ones are even cheaper. A quick search on eBay has brought boxes of 48 figures up for as little as £7.95, that's just 16p a figure. Consequently I've taken the plunge and bought a couple of boxes to have a look at and see if this is an idea worth pursuing.

For this potential project I am thinking about pinching an old idea from Tony Bath and use Hyboria from Robert E. Howard's Conan books as a ready made imaginary world but we'll see...

Lohner Over The Adriatic

Unfortunately it has been one of those weeks this week and I have not managed to progress anything much very far, though the Hansa W.29 and Junkers are a step closer to completion. Fortunately I have managed to add a new model to the AirWar: 1918 collection in the form of a lovely Austro-Hungarian Navy Lohner L flying boat.

The model is a pre-paint "toy" from a company called SORA and was picked up from a trader in Hong Kong via eBay. Dom Skelton kindly put me onto this and advised that whilst the model is not quite 1/144th it is good enough for wargames purposes. With a repaint it could see service as an Imperial German Navy Hansa-Brandenburg FB or an Italian Navy Macchi L.1 (both copies of the Lohner, the Macchi with a different engine and armament).

I think most of you will agree it is a nice looking model and a pleasant change from Sopwith Camels and Fokker Dr.1's.

Abaddon All Hope...

In between things this week I have managed to make some small progress on wargames matters. I now have three battalions (of nine) for a 6mm German infantry brigade for Élan fully painted and 1/144th Hansa-Brandenberg W.29 seaplane and Junkers D.1 monoplane fighter for AirWar: 1918 stuck together awaiting paint (with an AEG G.IV part way done). Photos of these soon, I am hoping to get the W.29 finished over the weekend.

Unfortunately a post-op hospital visit this week did not provide me with a clear prognosis but the prospect of at least one op (if not more). Nothing life threatening but it does drag you down... Whilst waiting around for consultations and pre-op assessments I managed to plow my way through most of Jonathan Green's Unnatural History, the first in Abaddon Books' Pax Britannia steampunk series.

Abaddon are for all intents and purposes producing pulp novels for today's readers and Unnatural History is a steampunk pulp book, high on entertainment and derring-do and less so on classic literature (not that it is meant to be). I must confess to being a bit of a VSF purist and prefer period fiction to modern pastiches but this was marketed as a light hearted fun read and I enjoyed it as such. It could have done with a good editor (twice a chapter ends with the main character yelling "the game's afoot!") and there is a dreadful continuity error where the bad guy fires a pistol at our hero and when we rejoin the action a couple of pages later the hero dodges the bad guys knife! This aside I did enjoy the book and would recommend it as a light hearted read full of Victoriana cliches and a possible fun Steampunk background to game in. The next one of the Pax Britannia series is sat waiting me to finish...

Black Hand Gang by Pat Kelleher, the first in Abaddon's new No Man's World series, the concept of which is similar to William R. Forstchen's Lost Regiment series, this time with a WW1 British unit ending up on an alien world (certainly an interesting gaming concept and probably easier to do than The Lost Regiment). About a third of the way in it's not grabbed me yet, there are too many characters to start with and the WW1 scenes are rather cliched, but we've just ended up on the alien planet so hopefully things will gather pace from now on. Interestingly both Pax Britannia and No Man's World have their own blogs, which you can access here and here respectively.

On Basilisk Station And More Great (Free) Stuff

Following on from the great Kindle revelation of yesterday I recalled a while back that US SF publisher Baen had sample chapters (and indeed whole books) online. A quick Google later and I found the Baen Free Library with the first books of many popular SF series, including On Basilisk Station, the first of the excellent Honor Harrington stories. I'm happy as I've always fancied reading Eric Flint's 1632 and here it is (with 1633, the second in the series).

It appears there are many useful sites with free Kindle e-books (indeed I got a bit enthusiastic downloading old G.A.Hentry historical novels last night from Amazon.com themselves) so a bit of Google-Fu is time well spent.