Mat McLachlan
Hachette Australia - NZ$34.99
Although this book is written by an Australian historian and approaches the subject from an Aussie viewpoint it will nevertheless also be a most useful and comprehensive guide for New Zealander's visiting these most famous of all of our battlefields.
The book initially contains loads of good advice about preparation and getting started, planning, where to stay, what to wear etc before detailing six separate tours. The visits can be walking or driving tours but McLachlan recommends walking as the best option.
The chunky almost 400 page book ends with excellent reference sections including a Gallipoli Timeline, sources and index.
About the author:
Mat McLachlan is one of Australia's leading war historians and battlefield guides, and has spent more than a decade following in the footsteps of Australian troops on battlefields around the world. His 2007 book, Walking with the Anzacs, is considered the definitive guide to Australian battlefields on the Western Front.
It was reprinted in 2008. Mat also produced and appears in the First World War documentary Lost in Flanders, airing on the ABC in 2009. His latest book Gallipoli, The Battlefield Guide, was releasedthis week and is be the most comprehensive guide to the Australian and New Zealand battlefields of Gallipoli yet published. He also appears regularly as a historian on the ABC, The History Channel and Channel 7's Sunrise.
Mat is the founder of Mat McLachlan Battlefield Tours and personally designs or escorts all our tours.
My only criticism of this otherwise excellent book is that the author and his publishers, Hachette Australia, should have made a much greater effort at aiming the book at both Australians and New Zealanders. For example the back cover blurb reads, in part, as follows:
Each year, thousands of Australians, young and old, visit Gallipoli to see where their fathers and grandfathers fought and died.... How difficult would it have been to added "and New Zealanders"?
No comments:
Post a Comment