The story of an odd couple-a British military historian and the Tawny Owl with whom he lived for fifteen yearsMartin Windrow was a war historian with little experience with pets when he adopted an owl the size of a corncob. Adorable but with knife-sharp talons, Mumble became Windrow's closest, if at times unpredictable, companion, first in a South London flat and later in the more owl-friendly Sussex countryside. In The Owl Who Liked Sitting on Caesar, Windrow recalls with wry humor their finer moments as well as the reactions of incredulous neighbors, the awkwardness of buying Mumble unskinned rabbit at Harrods Food Hall, and the grievous sense of loss when Mumble nearly escapes. As Windrow writes: "Mumble was so much a part of my life in those days that the oddity of our relationship seldom occurred to me, and I only thought about it when faced with other people's astonishment. When new acquaintances learned that they were talking to a book editor who shared a seventh-floor flat in a South London tower block with a Tawny Owl, some tended to edge away, rather thoughtfully . . . I tried to answer patiently, but I found it hard to come up with a short reply to the direct question 'Yes, but . . . why?'; my best answer was simply 'Why not?'" Windrow offers a poignant and unforgettable reminiscence of his charmed years with his improbable pet, as well as an unexpected education in the paleontology, zoology, and sociology of owls.

Product Description: The dramatic stories of history's gret sieges: Tyre, Jerusalem, Acre, Chateau-Gaillard, Constantinople, Tenochtitlan, Malta, Chittor Garh, Nagashino, Londonderry, Yorktown, Gibraltar, The Alamo, Vicksburg, and more. Includes maps and illustrations, complemented by fascinating asides on tactics, weaponry and life under siege...read more

A look at the events that doomed the French Empire and drew America into Vietnam examines the 1953 battle that demoralized and destroyed the French army and paved the way for the creation of the ill-fated country of South Vietnam.

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Book Description: The two hundred personalities described in this book have a fair claim to being the most significant in the last thousand years of military history. They include warrior kings and sultans, field marshals and ministers, tribal chiefs and junior officers...read more

Product Description: On June 6, 1944, one of the greatest military operations in history succeeded in landing some 155,000 men of the Allied armies on the shores of northern France. Before winning the battle of Normandy in late August, those troops endured some of the most savage and costly fighting of World War II...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: None of Napoleon's generals could succeed against the Duke of Wellington in a long series of clashes across Spain and Portugal in the Penisular campaign of 1808-1814; this epic struggle also produced unprecedented wear and tear on the uniforms of both sides, as accurately depicted in Gerry Embleton's paintings...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: Outlines the fascinating biographical details & often brutal careers of the 200 most outstanding land commanders from the 10th to the 20th century. From Brian Boru & Boleslav I to Major-General Lorde Wingate & Marshal Zhukov, this intriguing work of reference will be of immense value to the scholar & journalist & will provide hours of browsing pleasure for the amateur historian & military enthusiast...read more