Simon Scarrow

Working nights and the Christmas season have meant that little or no wargaming progress has been made this week. The arrival of the Wargamers Annual cheered what was turning out to be a grim few days, but more on that anon.

I've managed to finish putting together a gift for Mrs. Kinch's great uncle, a large scale resin figure of a British Officer from the Crimea. This was my first time working with resin or in this scale and it was considerably more fiddly than I anticipated, but I've managed to finish the preparatory work without endeavouring to glue my hands together or attach parts of his uniform to my face. All that remains is to paint him.

I would post pictures, but my phone is hors de combat at present, which is not helping matters.

What I have done in the mean time is a little reading, specifically the Revolution series by Simon Scarrow. I have the first two, Young Bloods and Generals. They are hefty volumes weighing in at over 400 pages each. Scarrow certainly writes books in which things happen, events come tripping off the page with pleasing rapidity - though it must be said that neither man lived a quiet life, so there was no shortage of material.

Scarrow certainly isn't a stylist and his characterisation is workmanlike at best, but as whole the books don't suffer for it. They're a well executed entertainment that takes the reader on a breakneck gallop through the lives of two exceptional men and should be enjoyed as such. Good fun, but I can't imagine Allan Mallinson looking over his shoulder with any trepidation.

Good, undemanding Christmas reading.