Reaching for the Sky

The title on the left will doubtless bring back memories of playing Air War back in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Doodlebugs and Rockets - shades of Operation Crossbow - also reminded me of the training scenario from Air Force that I also played a lot, back in the day.

Particularly pleased to have a copy of this little paperback. It came out around the time the film the Battle of Britain was released and I can remember buying a copy of this and an Airfix ‘Dog Fight Double’ featuring a Spitfire and a Me 110 with some birthday money. 

Local to us we have an internet based group called Freecycle. Essentially it is a site where people can upload anything that they want to dispose of for free. We have offloaded a number of items in the past and indeed, have also picked up the odd item. A couple of years ago someone listed a complete set of the Time Life ACW series - all 28 volumes - but I missed out by a whisker so when Laurel spotted that someone local wanted to dispose of 35 books on Aviation I jumped at the chance.

The collection is quite varied and covers early aircraft pioneers, test pilots, plenty of WW2 and some modern stuff. To be honest 17 titles are probably destined for the charity shop as whilst being interesting they are not military. I have earmarked half a a dozen for my own collection and the remainder, once sorted will be made available to whoever may be interested. 

Aside from the books depicted above I have an encyclopaedia of WW2 aircraft, a first edition copy of A Piece of Cake by Derek Robinson and a book about the making of the TV series of the same name. There is also a portfolio of biographies of 25 Battle of Britain RAF pilots - all fascinating reading.

Of course it now has me thinking once again about aerial wargames….