Acquisitions

Philip Anthony Towle. Pilots and Rebels: The Use of Aircraft in Unconventional Warfare 1918-1988. London: Brassey’s, 1989. From air control to counterinsurgency. A bit RAF-centric until after 1945.

Jan Rüger. The Great Naval Game: Britain and Germany in the Age of Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. A book I cited in my thesis. I don’t see why the library should have all the fun.

Charles Sowerwine. France Since 1870: Culture, Society and the Making of the Republic. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. Second Edition. French history is one of my weak points. If I’d taken one of Chips’ classes — he retired from my former department a few years ago — I might not have needed to buy his book.

As I said… I went back for more Shute! Neville Shute. No Highway. London: Vintage Books, 2009 [1948]. Not about the Comet and its metal-fatigue induced accidents, because it was written before the prototype even flew. Neville Shute. Pastoral. London: Vintage Books, 2009 [1944]. A Bomber Command romance.

I went on a mini-spending spree this week — mini because Vintage have recently cut their prices in Australia and are cheap as chips. Graham Greene. Brighton Rock. London: Vintage Books, 2004 [1938]. ‘Now a major motion picture’. Aldous Huxley. Ape and Essence. London: Vintage Books, 2005 [1949]. I couldn’t resist this after reading the

Juliet Gardiner. The Blitz: The British Under Attack. London: HarperPress, 2010. Another example of anniversary publishing, but I wouldn’t have misgivings about buying a Juliet Gardiner book. Except… I worry that it will cover too much of the same ground as her Wartime. Robin Higham and Frederick W. Kagan, eds. The Military History of the

Peter Hennessy. The Secret State: Preparing for the Worst 1945-2010. London: Penguin, 2010. Second edition. The instant classic on how the British government has gone about defending the realm, particularly in preparations for the Third World War. Hennessy has updated it with information from masses of newly declassified files from the Cold War, and has

Xmas wins! Gus Officer. Six O’Clock Diamond: The Story of a Desert Harrasser. Northcote: Woolhouse Press, 2008. The memoir of a Second World War RAAF Kittyhawk pilot, who in 1942 was shot down over the Western Desert and spent the rest of the war as a POW. Roland Perry. The Australian Light Horse: The Magnificent

J. M. Spaight. Volcano Island. London: Geoffrey Bles, 1943. Although Spaight is one of my guys, I didn’t know from the title alone if it was even about aviation. Turns out that it is; here’s the blurb from the front dustjacket: IN 1939, our Island was peaceful and innocuous; now in 1943, with its volcanic

Roger Beaumont. Might Backed by Right: The International Air Force Concept. Westport and London: Praeger, 2001. Some library gap-filling: it’s the only book on the history of the international air force idea there is, so I ought to have it. Doesn’t devote enough attention to the 1920s and 1930s for my liking, but for once