The Illustrated Directory of Guns: A Collector's Guide to Over 1500 Military, Sporting, and Antique Firearms

This is truly a Must have for every Firearm Technician! This book provides unlimited knowledge and usable Transfer of Skills to the Readers. There is a Picture of every Firearm listed, as well as written instructions and information on how best to work with specific Firearms. A Must have, Very Satisfied.

The book itself is rather comprehensive, but not too detailed. With over 1500 firearms, it's difficult to give more than a blurb per firearm. All in all it's 5 stars because it has everything I could think of and then special variations I didn't know existed, but it's light on the information side of things.

This made the perfect gift for a friend’s birthday! Well-made, easy to read and great photos.

Not enough index . I enjoy looking through it

My son is enjoying this book. He loves facts and information about subjects he likes to study—this book is filled with both. He is an adult and the book is appropriately written for mature readers.

this was a gift for my 23 yr old son who loves to read about guns. No complaints.

A beautifully illustrated book of very old and new firearms. A bargain for such a book!

Lots of info and great pictures. Great reference guide.

2,000 guns, 752 pages. NO INDEX!!!! What the heck??!!?! How am I supposed to find a gun? This cannot be called a “directory of guns” when there is no way to direct you towards the gun. It’s simply a list of guns. Great photos. Good short descriptions. But without an index, it’s worthless as a reference book.

Well researched - BUT UP TO A POINT!!! - well presented, richly illustrated, otherwise - routine coffee-table book. Might be a good gift (for non-collector), useful as a general reference. Contras: it is fully concentrated on contemporary arms, while true collectors' items are guns of the past: matchlocks, wheel locks, flintlocks (in particular) and percussion. The choice of these guns is occasional: France is left without Nicolas Boutet* - this is simply unforgivable! - without LePage and Gastinne Renette. England - no Robert Wogdon, no Twigg, Mortimer. No Purdey ! Imagine a guide to British paintings without Joshua Reynolds, Thomas Gainsborough, or Turner... One of the best gunsmiths in the world (Nock, Mantons) are there with the guns picked up from third-rate provincial salesrooms - where are famous duellers in their glory? By the way, just to few of them (British gunmakers of the last century)we owe fat too many important inventions, than to Flobert. Germany without Kuchenreuter? Belgian gunsmiths got somehow lost between "Austria" and "China", while Italy shared the fate of Belgium (not mentioned as a country), and came without superb Brescian guns. Russia had something in Tula already under Peter the Great - just few centuries before "TT", while Spain was worldknown for super miquelet locks - also few centuries before "Astra". I presume that if someone is about to produce a guns' directory for collectors, the illustrations should come from Bonhams, Thomas Del Mar, Maison Osenat, Hermann Historica - these are world leaders selling quality arms and armour. Furthermore - since it is supposed to be for collectors (newcomers apparently) - some advice and guidance on prices, fakes and "made-up" things, how to by and where to buy, restoration and LEGISLATION (what kind of permit one need to buy and to keep various types of guns, restrictions on shipping, customs, etc, etc - Dante's seven circles of Hell are nothing when compared to that) should have been in the book. First of all, I would have expected a brief summary of the evolution of firearms, and an illustrated explanation of the terms (wheellock, miquelet, full stock, box lock, etc, etc). *Sorry, but Boutet was gunsmith for the King and Emperor (Napoleon)and director of Manufacture of Versailles - which is a bit above manufacture St.Etienne. All in all - the book is beautifully done, and ruined by total lack of qualified editing. I do not doubt the expertise of the author - for sure, he tried many guns first-hand (although, I doubt that he had an experience with Mantons or Durs Egg). As a retired professional alcoholic I drank many wines - but it doesn't mean that I knew the taste. A different kind of knowledge is required for collectors' guide, and this knowledge simply is not in. Guns collecting, this most noble and decadent vice, was well described by Frederick Wilkinson and Keith Neal, after them there was no need to come with such messy affair

recomendo para quem gosta de armas.

What we have here is a good book betrayed by the lack of a competent editor. The text is littered with typos and outright mistakes; most of the latter are obvious, though irritating. Photos lack captions; captions lack photos; photos have mistaken captions. A few photos show up in the wrong place. So why did I give this book 3 stars? First, the price is right. Second, there are hundreds of colour photos. Third, several rare weapons are covered. And last but not least, most of the text is spot on. I hope the author reads this review. A few days of correcting errors would result in a book that is well worth buying.