Two Mags

PAYING £6.99 for a magazine strikes me as a lot, especially when compared with most paperback history books.

But issue 38 of Ancient History proved too much of a temptation with its theme of Finding & Founding A New Home - Colonization In Antiquity.

Meanwhile issue 340 of Slingshot arrived in the post, but I fear I still cannot get used to the reduction in content caused by the use of a much bigger typeface.

Two mags

Angling For England

FOR my trip to Transylvania I was going to take just two books: Tim Parks' The Hero's Way - Walking With Garibaldi From Rome To Ravenna, and Philip Sabin's Lost Battles - Reconstructing The Great Clashes Of The Ancient World.

But I popped into Foyles in London's Charing Cross Road shortly before the trip began and bought a signed copy of Marc Morris's The Anglo-Saxons - A History Of The Beginnings Of England.

I am glad I did because even so I ran out of reading material before my nine-day visit was over.

But I am especially pleased I bought Morris's book as it is a riveting read, the only sore point being it ends at the Battle of Stamford Bridge in early 1066.

The Anglo-Saxons - not quite a "masterpiece"

Whether he ran out of space or time to finish the book, or whether a part two is planned, I cannot say, but otherwise it was for me £10.99 well spent.