On Mount TBR

I don't know what I expected from this.

And I don't know what I got.

It seems somewhat ironic that Neil Oliver goes on about heroism and what it could teach the men of today about living their lives when basically he ponces about, flipping his hair and talking to a television camera.

To me, he was always onto a loser because of his hero worship of Captain Scott, who I dislike intensely - Scott was foolish, snobbish and ultimately a poor leader (I'm in the Shackleton camp, you may have guessed). And several of the stories were of pointless heroism - the Charge of the Light Brigade, Scott's expedition (it wasn't even scientifically worthwhile), the Zulu wars ... what is so great about obeying orders you know to be wrong?

Happy trails, little book! I hope you have an interesting journey!

This looks like fun, boys-own daring-do adventures. Picked up at today's Ipswich meet-up with friendly faces and a 'newbie' :)

(23/01/18) I don't really know Neil Oliver and was less worried about the fanboy idiolisation of Scott than @beeofgoodcheer, but I did find other things annoying. Ferinstance, the constant reference to 'manly men', even if this is meant to be ironic it wore a bit, and the contrived links from each separate story back to Scott's progress to stardom...and eventual heroic failure it has to be said. I did however really love the potted retelling of each amazing tale, ranging from the Ancient Greeks (Thermopylae/300) to the Battle of Britain, although strangely light on WW1? A lot of the familiar British Empire classics are here, including stunning against-the-odds victories and one-sided routs, but also many different non-war related tales from around the world which loosely fit Oliver's heroic criteria. I particularly liked The Birkenhead Drill explaining the first request, women and children first (or more correctly, 'First women and children'.)

Adding to the growing sharing shelf for visitors :)

I'm going things around a bit ... this is going to the Ipswich UnConvention 2018 for the 'table of temptation' and my fellow bookcrossers :)

Got it from the book buffet at the Ipswich Unconvention. Thanks for sharing!