Started: July 12
Finished: July 17
Notes: I've been looking forward to this one. The author is a well known weapons smith among modern sword communities, and this book looks to entail a lot of information about swords. Originally I had thought this book was a mere collection of information about modern sword makers, but a quick flip through its pages has shown me it is much more.
Mini review: This one is a keeper. Yes, there was some basic information about various U.S. sword makers, and plenty of visual examples, but this book was so much more than that. It got into the different types of steel to be used for swords, the different tempering methods and heating treatments, and I'll add that not all of this is the same for different types of swords (here the focus was somewhat general but seemed to lean a little toward the longsword). Basically, this was a run-through on how to make your own sword, starting with a bar of iron and finishing with how to wrap the handle with wire. There's also some basic information about good practices for using a sword and how to pick a good sword from a simple hunk of metal shaped like a sword. Not all of this information will be of interest to everyone, and I might have made this book sound overly complex in nature, but this was a pretty easy read with maybe only one chapter going a little over my head concerning the technical aspects. For someone interested in making swords, this would be a good place to start.
Sounds like a great reference.
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