I’ve always been a reader and I think I still have my first book Baby’s First Book published by Ladybird around 1966 – it still gets a thrashing when the twins are here as it is now one of their favourites…

I was always the boy who would rather be with a book than doing anything else but I am very glad my parents forced the issue on many occasions and I learned to ride, swim and do work. I would devour anything and by the time I was ten or so, had quite a respectable library. My earliest memory of a real book (one where text outweighed pictures was a back to back volume of Robin Hood and The Knights of the Round Table. Other early literary memories include The Midnight Folk and a Reader’s Digest version of Miracle at Midway – the start of a lifelong fascination with this pivotal encounter. My grandparents on Mum’s side also had a pretty respectable library and I recall Travis VC, Air Above the Ground and Dynamite for Hire as early reads; plus dozens and dozens of Reader’s Digest Condensed Books.

Comics were never encouraged much at home – we subscribed to Look And Learn for a few years: it was a great source of information but the main attraction for me was the comic serials in each issue like Jason January and The Trigan Empire. It was a major coup when I was eight to convince my parents that a subscription to Countdown/TV Action would be a really really good idea: woohoo! Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet, Dr Who, Fireball XL-5 and other favourites (even now!). I gave that up as a bad joke when it was taken over by American crime shows like Hawaii Five-O, Cannon, etc.

In the mid-70s, I discovered the local book exchange, though I don’t think I have ever exchanged a single book – once I get ’em, I keep ’em! Here I discovered E.E. ‘Doc’ Smith‘s Galactic Patrol (over time have slowly acquired others in the Lensman series – his other series never quite appealed)  and Don Pendleton‘s implacable Mack Bolan: Jersey Guns was my first Executioner and again I acquired most of the original series until the ghost writers who took over from Pendleton just got too sad…A casual purchase at teh Invercargill bus station introduced me to Jerry Pornelle and Janissaries and from there Keith Laumer’s BOLOs, and David Weber’s Honor Harrington and the whole Baenoverse…

In the late 80s, I joined a great UK-based military book club that had a broad selection of themed books and I moved to Singapore for two years and used both opportunities to expand my library. Around the same time, my room-mate introduced me to Dean Koontz via Lightning and this kicked off another phase…In fact this was a period of new authors with names like Tom Clancy, Stephen Coonts and Dale Brown coming to the fore…

The common theme through most of my reading is right v wrong, good guys and bad guys…I like things, even complex things, to be this simple…

I’ve always been a big non-fiction reader and this was further developed when I became an early Audible listener. The original subscription plan didn’t roll over so I’d often be selected my two books a month only minutes before the credits expired each month. This encouraged me to select a broader range of books that I might have if I was more organised, and many of these were non-fiction. but not all of them…

In 2000, my boss made us all read Blackhawk Down…a greet read in its own right but also fantastic preparation for later roles in counter-insurgency thinking. I tend to hold non-fiction to a higher standard than fiction. I expect it to be well-written and logical – probably a carry-over from Laurie Barber’s “critically assess” – and sadly find many more recent works, disappointing and superficial.

Since the big move from the Lodge much of the library has been all boxed up, partly the penalty of a smaller home and partly the shelving sacrificed in the move. I do Kindle – hooked by Nook – but while appreciating the utility of being able to carry countless books on a device, it’s still not the same as the feel of real paper…

I may produce my own one day – lots of ideas – but that’s still to come…