Introduction

This book covering the M1 ABRAMS is part of a series of titles from Pen and Sword as part of their ‘Images at War’ series. These books cover the subject matter mostly in photographs and so offer a great visual reference for anyone interested in the subject matter regardless of the reason for that interest. For the modeller these books represent a horn of plenty when it comes to visual information.

Review

This offering from Pen and Sword is part of the ‘Images at War’ series. This series of books are soft backed offerings having a good card cover with a very good spine to the book that keeps the contents in good order. This book covering the M1 ABRAMS has been authored by David Doyle. The contents of this title are provided on 232 pages of good quality semi gloss paper.

The contents are presented in the following sections:
Chapter 1 – The XM1
Chapter 2 – The Improved Performance M1
Chapter 3 – The M1E1
Chapter 4 – The M1A1
Chapter 5 – Mine Plows and Blades
Chapter 6 – M1A2 SEP
Chapter 7 – The Assault Breacher Vehicle
Chapter 8 – The ABRAMS Deployed

The dedicated text in this offering is minimal as that is not the purpose of these books as they are not designed to be read in the truest sense of the word. There are a few pages of text that are well written and provide brief sections of information that guide the viewer on the tour of the visual reference provided.

You may be thinking why would I want something that amounts to a picture book? The answer to that is simple. The photographs in the book offer a great look at the various ABRAMS and the tanks that were the result of the development programme behind a tank that has already seen 40 years of service. The part that makes this book a stunning offering is that along with the photographs with have some of the best captions I have seen. These captions provide a great level of information and clearly identify what you are looking at and points you into noting specifics that may otherwise be easily missed.

I was pleased to see the very early production tank variants as that helps the viewer follow the changes that led up to and including the M1A2 SEP. Another particularly pleasing section as far as I am concerned is the one looking at the mine plows and blades as I feel these add a great deal of visual interest on a vehicle that is being covered by a great deal of modellers and it provides the finished models with a very different look that attracts viewers. The reason I like this section so much is because the plows and blades get limited visual coverage and this section really enables the modeller to add the bells and whistles.

Conclusion

This offering from Pen and Sword as part of their Images of War series is a great visual delight for the modeller. It directs you to look at details that may easily be missed due to size and or location along with captions that do an excellent job of identifying what you are looking at. I know that some would have preferred to see a lot more text in this book, but I do not see that as the purpose of this title and if you consider the length of the captions there is a lot of text in the title.