Go Strong into the Desert

[mike snook]

Hi Mark

Pardon my ignorance - OMRS?

As ever

M

[Jonathan]

Hi Mark

Pardon my ignorance - OMRS?

As ever

M

Orders & Medals Research Society

[SteveMc1958]

Mike

Your book was waiting for me on arriving home this evening. It looks simply outstanding.

I have devoured it cover to cover already (looking at the photos only, so far, of course!). It is a fine example of what modern miltary history books should be like - you, the illustrators and the publishers are to be warmly congratulated. I hope you have a roaring success on your hands.

Steve

[richvictoriana]

Hello Mike...

I would like to get your new book so I can add it to my library with the rest of you books after I read it thoroughly. Can I buy it now and could you note where? Thanks very much. And I hope you are doing well wherever you are traipsing around!

U.S. Rich

[Jonathan]

Rich,
It can be purchased from Perry Miniatures:

http://www.perry-miniatures.com/index2.html

Jonathan

[roconn]

Jonathon:
Yep! Perry`s Miniatures UK was really speedy in acknowledging the order and sending it off. Really like efficient dealing!
roconn

[richvictoriana]

Jonathan...

Thanks for the heads up on Mike Snook's new book.

Rich

[mike snook]

Ahhhhh....thank you,Jonathan.

Gosh yes that does sound like an expensive place to spend temptation time, Mark.

Steve - thanks chum...I appreciate your kind words.

Rich,

Tip top thanks chum. Yourself? Sounds like you've found the right place to order your book. The postage to USA is a bit steep but it is a large book, and the Perrys are taking a very large slice of the postage hit for the USA customer directly out of their profits I gather. In Brit money I think it costs them 12 pounds fifty to post but they are charging you guys only 9 pounds or something around that mark. Home is once again darkest Africa. Hope all is well in NY.

As ever

Mike

[fantomark]

Ciao!

My two copies of THE BOOK have just come in!

This volume is really a masterpice in the difficult art of historical divulgation .
It is really amazing how much information and details you have been able to pack in one single volume, still keeping text eminently readable.
Also, the quality and quantity of illustrations is really exceptional.
If I should express any criticism, I would only say that to do full justice to the superb colour plates , these should have been printed in larger format. However I do realize that space was not unlimited!

I am sure that this book will be a tremendous boost for Perry Miniatures' Sudan Range! Even I now fell tempted to unearth my brushes and paints again and reach for my Perry Box, after almost two year of sabbatic abstinence from figure painting!

Again congratulations!

Cheers!

Mark

[mike snook]

Ciao Marco

You're one up on me old pal - or rather two up on me - as I still don't own and have never seen the finished product. Her Britannic Majesty is very kindly sending her chaps in Africa some mail tomorrow, so maybe one will turn up then. I'm glad you like it - I suspect I'll probably end up sympathising but not necessarily agreeing with you about the plates (they are damned good for sure - Michael worked very hard on them - I lived the experience with him online night after night until the weeks had turned into months and months). But any book has to reconcile its various qualities in order to remain affordable to the book-buying public. This is not a picture book - this is a scrupulously researched military history with the added benefit of a great many illustrations supporting the words (around 75,000 of them), including more than 40 entirely original uniform plates (not to mention the previously unseen battlefield photography). The plates then are in a supporting role.

If £25 is your top whack for the book-buyer - which is what we decided - then one can afford to include lots of slightly small plates, or many fewer but slightly larger plates. The plates are perfectly clear, they are not intended for framing but rather to impart information to the interested reader, and the sheer quantity of them should, I tend to think, attract only positive comment, rather than a slightly negative 'wish they were bigger'. They could have been....but would you have parted with 40 quid? Probably as one of the very keenest Sudan enthusiasts you personally would have done, but how many others would part with that much money? If the answer to that question is 'not many' - which is indeed the answer - then the project would never have been viable in the first place. That's how publishing works mon ami - like most things in life it's about compromises.

I am very conscious that I am writing for the enjoyment of ordinary people and I like my stuff to be affordable. The prices that some second hand sellers asked for my Zulu War books when they became scarce made me very cross - sheer exploitation of people's enthusiasm and of whatever small talent with the quill that the Good Lord farmed out in my direction. I am pleased to say that the paperbacks are now out with Frontline/Pen & Sword (also a new run of hardbacks for the Rorke's Drift book) which should hopefully have torpedoed the game being played over the past year by the second-hand bandits. (Could it ever be right that a book published in 2005 would command 300 US dollars!)

So with a project of the GSITD kind your starting point is the price you think will be fair for 'the man in the street', and then it's a question of seeing just how much history and artwork you can cram in without bankrupting the publisher. In this case I think we can reasonably claim to have done wonders for 25 quid.....or at least it looked that way when I went through the proofs. I'd really like to see the real thing now.......fortunately I've had too much on my plate in the day job to worry about it.

Anyway...I hope that's a useful glimpse at some of the decision-making processes in the publishing game. In the meantime enjoy the read old chap. I really appreciate the kind words - it always makes the next project a bit easier to confront... and having been doing two jobs - soldier and writer - for more than five years without a rest I need all the encouragement I can get!!

As ever

Mike

[fantomark]

HI, Mike!

Well, perhaps I was just a bit too greedy, like a boy so happy with his ice cream that he would like to have an even bigger one, if possible!

Seriously, I do agree with you ,selling price must always be a primary consideration for any commercial publication , and this book is absolutely exceptional value for money, and it is definitely the best researched and the most visually appealing book on the First Sudan War I have seen.

Talking about encouragement....: any chance we might see , even in a remote future, a "follow-up" volume with an account of the Nile Frontier, the "between the wars" years, and the Omdurman campaign? - yes, I know: I am still asking for too much - but such a work would really be "The definitive complete history of the Sudan Campaigns!!"

Again congratulations!

Ciao!

Mark

[JBL]

Mike,

Here in the USA I, too, have got my copy of "Go Strong into the Desert" and would like to offer my warmest congratulations to you and Perry Miniatures. Not only are the illustrations, most of which I've never before seen, first rate, but the narrative and battle analysis are outstanding. It's easily the best general treatment of the topic, ever. I can hardly wait for "Beyond the Reach of Empire."

Best wishes,
John

[mike snook]

Mark

Heh heh....too true...there's just never enough ice cream is there! Well the mail did arrive today and it did indeed contain a GSITD. Nice ain't it......though I say so myself! The backroom team have done a great job. Plates in a three inch margin and about 5 inches high - that's what we planned so I'm entirely happy with that old chum.

Yes.....I know where you're coming from and it might be a lot of fun to do, and as you rightly say, they would make a handsome pair. But books have to be commissioned - I just write them! I think Michael Perry wouldn't want to do a part 2 unless he had made a range of model soldiers for the later period - and I simply don't know where he stands on that. I'm pretty sure he wouln't want to commit himself one way or the other at present. For my part I couldn't contemplate it for at least two and possibly three years.....but I'm certainly not ruling out a reconquest book at some point. Next comes the relief expedition for Frontline/Pen & Sword...but it's going a bit slower than I'd hoped due to pressure of work by day.

Anyway....let's not worry about that...see what you think about some of the stuff in GSITD.

As ever

Mike

[mike snook]

Thanks John. You're a gentleman sir. Glad to know the ship made it through the u-boat packs!

Regards

Mike

[fantomark]

Hi, Mike!

Well, as a collector of Perry Miniatures Sudan figures, I have been "lobbying" with the Perry Twins about a Sudan Reconquest range, for a couple of years now !
and I keep hoping!

Cheers!

Marco