books Archives - Felix's Gaming Pages

Dead of Night

This spring sees the release of the new Alex Garland film, Civil War. Set in an America which is breaking apart, the film is about a group of journalists travelling across the United States in an ever escalating conflict which is engulfing the entire country.

Though I’ve not seen the film and don’t know how it ends, I was reminded of a book I have read, Dead of Night by Brendan DuBois, which is about the aftermath of a (near) civil war in the US.

For years UN peacekeepers have been deployed to war-torn regions of the world from Rwanda to Serbia and Congo to East Timor.

Now it’s America’s turn.

Samuel Simpson is a young, idealistic journalist from Canada. Seeking adventure, he volunteers to become a records keeper for a UN war-crimes investigation team at work in upper New York State. Months earlier, a crippling terrorist attack against the United States resulted in its cities being emptied, its countryside set afire, and its government shaken to its knees. In the aftermath of this attack, a virtual civil war broke out, until UN peacekeepers arrived to establish an uneasy peace. While Samuel and his team travel through the New York countryside, searching for evidence of an atrocious war crime, he promptly realizes that death is quick to strike from any farmhouse, road corner, or rest area.

There are lots of potential gaming scenarios from this background.

I mentioned in my previous post on Civil War that the background to the film raises a lot of ideas for gaming scenarios. The aftermath of the situation after the film, with the addition of UN peacekeepers adds a range of different forces, vehicles, aircraft, and armour.

Sharpe’s Command

The next Sharpe book has been published, Sharpe’s Command.

“If any man can do the impossible it’s Richard Sharpe . . .”

And the impossible is exactly what the formidable Major Sharpe is asked to do when he’s dispatched on an undercover mission behind enemy lines, deep in the Spanish countryside. For a remote village is about to become the centre of a battle for the future of Europe. Sitting high above the Almaraz bridge, it is the last link between two French armies, one in the north and one in the south; if they meet, the British are doomed. Only Sharpe’s small group of men – with their cunning and courage to rely on – stand in their way. But they’re rapidly outnumbered, enemies are hiding in plain sight, and time is running out . . .

I think Bernard Cornwell taking Sharpe back to the Peninsular War (rather than forward) was a really clever idea.

I enjoyed the last Sharpe book, Sharpe’s Assassin, it was great to see Sharpe back in action.

Buy Sharpe’s Command from Amazon.

From Crimea with Love: Misadventures in the Making of Sharpe’s Rifles

After rediscovering Sharpe, I also saw that Jason Salkey, who played Private Harris has written a book about his experiences in making the series: From Crimea with Love: Misadventures in the Making of Sharpe’s Rifles.

In the summer of 1992, Jason Salkey was cast in a role that would change his life forever. Sharpe’s Rifles, a Napoleonic war drama, was to be shot in the Crimean Peninsula. Little did the producers know that they would be sending Jason and the crew to film in a rapidly disintegrating Soviet Union. There they faced near-starvation and danger round every corner as they set about creating one of Britain’s most successful and critically acclaimed television programmes.

From Crimea with Love documents the mishaps, blunders, incompetence and downright corruption that made Sharpe’s Rifles go down in British television folklore for its unique tales of hardship. Follow the cast through intense depravation and constant catastrophe until they become every bit the jaded, battle-hardened soldiers we saw on screen. Tapping into his diaries, photo journals and video log, Jason brings you an eye-opening, jaw-dropping insider’s account of one of the best-loved shows ever made.

I once met Jason at Salute, when it was at Kensington Town Hall.

A Bridge Too Far

I have been meaning to watch this film again for a while after reading Antony Beevor’s The Battle of Arnhem: The Deadliest Airborne Operation of World War II.

In the book, Antony Beevor, using often overlooked sources from Dutch, American, British, Polish, and German archives, has reconstructed the terrible reality of the fighting.

On September 17, 1944, General Kurt Student, the founder of Nazi Germany’s parachute forces, heard the groaning roar of airplane engines. He went out onto his balcony above the flat landscape of southern Holland to watch the air armada of Dakotas and gliders, carrying the legendary American 101st and 82nd Airborne Divisions and the British 1st Airborne Division. Operation Market Garden, the plan to end the war by capturing the bridges leading to the Lower Rhine and beyond, was a bold concept, but could it have ever worked? The cost of failure was horrendous, above all for the Dutch who risked everything to help. German reprisals were pitiless and cruel, and lasted until the end of the war.

The film, A Bridge Too Far, was shot on-location in the Netherlands, in many of the real locations where the historical events took place. At the time of its release, it was the most expensive film ever produced.

Richard Attenborough directs this star-studded account of the failed 1944 Arnhem assault. The story follows the events of Operation Market Garden, a plot that was intended to allow the Allies access to the German lines to seize control of bridges in the occupied Netherlands. The cast includes Dirk Bogarde as Lieutenant-General Frederick Browning, James Caan as Staff Sergeant Eddie Dohun, Robert Redford as Major Julian Cook and Sean Connery as Major General Roy Urquart.

I have watched it many times, but still find it a fascinating and enjoyable film.

It’s a long film at nearly three hours long, but it covers the preparation the three air drops, the ground assault and much of the fighting across the bridges and other objectives.

Yes you can quibble about some of the vehicles used, the floating Sherman tank for example, or the use of the Leopard post-war tank as a German Panther. However there are many other accurate period vehicles used (which were being decommissioned at the time from various European armies).

Lots of gaming ideas in the film as well.

Get A Bridge Too Far on Blur-Ray.

Alpha and Omega

I am tempted by the new Harry Turtledove novel, Alpha and Omega.

What would happen if the ancient prophecy of the End of Days came true? It is certainly the last thing Eric Katz, a secular archaeologist from Los Angeles, expects during what should be a routine dig in Jerusalem. But perhaps higher forces have something else in mind when a sign presaging the rising of the Third Temple is located in America, a dirty bomb is detonated in downtown Tel Aviv, and events conspire to place a team of archaeologists in the tunnels deep under the Temple Mount. It is there that Eric is witness to a discovery of such monumental proportions that nothing will ever be the same again.

Buy the book from Amazon.

SS-GB

Adapted from Len Deighton’s 1978 alternate history novel, and starring Sam Riley and Kate Bosworth, SS-GB premieres on BBC One on the 19th February 2017.

Produced by Sid Gentle Films Ltd and written by Bafta Award-winners Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, SS-GB is a complex thriller focusing on British Detective Douglas Archer.

Forced to work under the brutal SS in occupied London, Archer is determined to continue to do his job in the service of his country, but against impossible odds.

We first meet Archer in 1941, with the vast majority of England and Wales are under Nazi occupation after losing the Battle of Britain. Pockets of resistance continue to show their defiance against the occupying German forces, but after a German pilot is murdered by a British Resistance fighter, tensions in London could not be higher.

When investigating what appears to be a simple black market murder, Archer is dragged into a much darker and more treacherous world where the stakes are as high as the ultimate outcome of the war. The elusive American journalist Barbara Barga may hold the key – but can he trust her? And when his lover Sylvia endangers her life by bravely making a stand against the oppressive regime, Archer is forced to confront a deeper dilemma. Can he carry out his duty to defend law and order when he is working for the wrong side? What is he willing to risk in the fight against fascism?

The trailer and the images released so far, show a disturbing image of London under Nazi occupation. What may have happened if the proposed Operation Sealion was successful and Britain had lost the Battle of Britain in 1940.

Though most experts agree that there was little or no chance of Operation Sealion ever succeeding, many people have wondered and extrapolated what could have happened if it had indeed taken place and the Germans were victorious.

The background of SS-GB offers a range of gaming scenarios across different kinds of actions and scales. I may explore these in a later post once I have viewed the first few episodes.

Steampunk Soldiers: The American Frontier

Those of you who are regular readers of the blog will know that I have been playing around with Old West figures and games, but have also been adding Steampunk elements to my games, as reflected in various articles published on the blog.

The new release from Osprey, is right up my street. Steampunk Soldiers: The American Frontier.

Even as the discovery and exploitation of hephaestium helped bring the Civil War to its close in 1869, the arms race it engendered resulted in a cold war just as bitter and violent as the open hostilities had been. With neither side willing to rely solely upon the talents of their scientific establishments, saboteurs, double-agents, and assassins found ample employment. Against this backdrop of suspicion and fear, thousands of Americans – Northerners and Southerners alike – headed west. Some to escape the legacies of the war, some to find their own land, some for the lure of that great undiscovered strike of hephaestium that would make them rich, and some simply to escape the law. Ahead of these pioneers stood the native tribes, behind them followed the forces of two governments, while to the north and south, foreign powers watched closely for their own opportunities. This newly unearthed collection of the works of Miles Vandercroft fills a considerable gap in our knowledge of the travels of that remarkable individual, and also provides a fascinating guide to the costume and equipment of the forces active in the great drive westwards.

It sounds like an ideal background for a steampunk version of the old west. This publication accompanies the original Steampunk Soldiers which was published in 2014.

Between 1887 and 1895, the British art student Miles Vandercroft travelled around the world, sketching and painting the soldiers of the countries through which he passed. In this age of dramatic technological advancement, Vandercroft was fascinated by how the rise of steam technology at the start of the American Civil War had transformed warfare and the role of the fighting man. This volume collects all of Vandercroft’s surviving paintings, along with his associated commentary on the specific military units he encountered. It is a unique pictorial guide to the last great era of bright and colourful uniforms, as well as an important historical study of the variety of steam-powered weaponry and equipment that abounded in the days before the Great War of the Worlds.

Both of these Osprey publications follow a typical Osprey publication with text and pictures.

If you are interested in gaming steampunk then check these publications out.

Illustrated Harry Potter Books

So if you like Harry Potter, you will be pleased to hear that there are now new illustrated versions.

All seven books will be made available. Amazon have the Philosopher’s Stone for £15.

These versions are also available as digital versions from iBooks.

Bolt Action on the Kindle

I did not know this. The Bolt Action rules are available for the Kindle as an eBook and in some cases are significantly cheaper than the printed versions.

Though I prefer real paper books when playing games (and for filling the bookshelf) I can certainly see the potential usefulness of having rules and source books on a tablet device.

With lower prices on the Kindle books I can also see the value in getting some of the source books especially those for those nations used by your opponents.

Get Bolt Action for the Kindle.

Steampunk Soldiers

Really like the idea and concept of this recent publication by Osprey, Steampunk Soldiers, covers a world which might have been.

Steampunk Soldiers is a unique pictorial guide to the last great era of bright and colourful uniforms, as well as an important historical study of the variety of steam-powered weaponry and equipment that abounded in the days before the Great War of the Worlds.

The book is full of full colour pages, as with many Osprey publications and I really love the back story of how and why the book was published.

Steampunk Soldiers

As one of the reviewers says:

When Samantha Callaghan approached Osprey with her great-great uncle, Miles Vandercroft’s collection of paintings and notes she didn’t really know what she had on her hands, but the publishers were soon to realise that they had a potential hit on their hands, or so the introduction leads us to believe.

If you like Osprey books and like Steampunk then you are going to probably like this book.

Order Steampunk Soldiers from Amazon