Recommended Read

FINALLY got around to reading Jonathan Clements' A Brief History Of Khubilai Khan - Lord Of Xanadu, Emperor Of China, which I bought in March in Hampstead for £3.99, marked down from £8.99.
My current trip to Bavaria gave me the necessary spare time, helped today by it literally raining non-stop, and the book has proved a riveting read.

Khubilai … part of publisher Robinson's A Brief History series

I cannot claim to have more than a passing general knowledge of the Mongols, but Clements' treatment of his subject comes across as balanced and dispassionate, not being afraid to point out where sources are contradictory and/or problematic.
There is little in the book for wargamers per se - no battle maps, for example - but I found the whole description of Mongol warfare and life to be engrossing.
I will certainly look out for more books by Clements, and for more on the Mongols.

Book Knowledge

CHARITY shops are well-known as a good source of cheap books, although I find them more useful for travel books than for history.
My favourite travel books tend to have a historical bias, however, so my recent purchase of Heinrich Harrer's Seven Years In Tibet from a charity shop - Oxfam, I think - in Tunbridge Wells should scratch both itches (assuming events in the 1940s count as history rather than current affairs).
There is a book-selling establishment in Hampstead which, while not a charity shop, has something of the feel of one as it only opens on Saturdays, I believe, and consists of mostly remaindered books laid out on temporarily erected trestle tables in a sort of passageway off the High Street.
Last month I bought there A Brief History Of Khubilai Khan - Lord Of Xanadu, Emperor Of China for £3.99, marked down from £8.99.

A Khan-do type of guy

The author, Jonathan Clements, is credited as "a leading expert on Asian history" and the writer of biographies of Marco Polo and the Chinese empress Wu Zetian.
The book includes an index - never a bad sign.