Peter Gray. The Leadership, Direction and Legitimacy of the RAF Bomber Offensive from Inception to 1945. London and New York: Continuum, 2012. An interesting title, and looks like an accurate one (if an annoyingly difficult one to shorten for citations!) Gray's background before doing his PhD (which this book is based upon) is in the RAF, where he was director of the Defence Leadership and Management Centre; so he certainly has useful experience to bring to the first two parts of the title. But it's probably his take on the legitimacy question that I'll most be interested to read. Well, that and the chapter on the intellectual context.
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Ross
You mean you actually bought it! Without trying to sound unbiased because as you know Peter is my supervisor, however, it is a very good piece of scholarship. I wrote a review of it here:
https://secondworldwaroperationsresearchgroup.wordpress.com/2013/02/04/book-review-the-leadership-direction-and-legitimacy-of-the-raf-bomber-offensive-from-inception-to-1945/
Brett Holman
Post authorYes, well, I was always going to get it one way or another, but I was hoping I'd to be asked to review it! Alas for my credit card, that never happened...
Ross
Thankfully, my bank account did not have to feel that pain. The cost of academic books is always frustrating an needs to be modified.
Brett Holman
Post authorThey do (the link you posted to Christopher Bell's blog was interesting on academic book prices), but I don't hold out any high hopes in that regard. Ebooks seem to have done nothing to improve affordability.
Ross
Yes, Chris Bell's comments were interesting. His comment concerning Routledge is familiar. My undergrad supervisor, Professor John Buckley, made the same observation when he published his 'British Armour in the Normandy Campaign'. Unlike Chris, he was further along in the process. However, Routledge do have a history of bringing out paperbacks, as do Bloomsbury, though these always seem to take an age. I believe they have to reach a magic number before the publisher considers it. Ashgate on the other never seem to do paperbacks. Either that or that books just never seem to reach the magic number! I agree e-books have done nothing to improve affordability, however, I am old fashioned and still prefer a book in my hand.
JDK
Looks like Brett and I need to have a secret talk so Brett can post his "the academic's guide to getting their book out so it's cheap and wide".
Brett Holman
Post authorJDK:
Of course I'll defer to your wisdom, but I'm convinced by Bell's argument that the first thing to do is not write a book for academics and expect publishers to market it to a popular audience! Though no doubt there are counterexamples.
JDK
Trying to avoid a long response - there's no great mystery to publishing; it's a classic business model, most modifications are tried.
JDK
Oh, and I actually agree with your last comment Brett. I can't list the numerous errors in Chris' frank blogposts.