“Lazy Mary get out of bed!

“She says to me

“I am not able!

 “Lazy Mary you must get up!

“We need the sheets

“For the table!”

 Or

 “Eh cumpari…!”

So sang Luigi Monte and Julius de la Rosa, rollickingly and melodically, on popular songs, reinforcing many of our stereotypic impressions of the Italian character as largely happy-go-lucky, forkful of lasagna in one hand, glass of Chianti in the other.

 Military history students of especially World War Two are familiar with Italian aircraft and armoured vehicles being consistently ‘rated’ as ‘inferior’ to (especially oft-referenced) American, British and German. Looking at it from the other side, what amazes this reviewer is how the nation of Italy, only twice the size of Illinois (about 20% more land area than the UK) and with the population (currently) of California, had such a large (and in the case of its WW II ships), world-competitive arms industry.

 And perhaps be surprised; the three 1940-new Littorio class battleships were every bit as big and tough and heavily armed as the fabled Bismarck..

 For those convinced of Italian arms’ inferiority, ‘twill be therefore a bit of a surprise, perusing the book, Regia Marina; Italian Battleships of World War Two,  featuring page after page of graceful, good looking, but let us not forget their life’s purpose…menacing, lethally dangerous warships. Flipping a number of pages and seeing (delightfully) unfamiliar period photos, competent drawings and intriguing, informative text…resulted in the book moving from a mild curiosity to one of those ‘must haves.’ 

Sitting down later, in a comfy chair at home with this ‘Squadron-In Action’ style / format book, a deeper perusal of Bagnasco and Grossman’s authorship did not result in disappointment.

 In the book’s 74 pages (which include a good piece of cover art, colour paint samples and plan view illustrations), the reader receives a scholarly delivery of each Regia Marina battleship’s history and enough artwork to keep any boat geek’s interest, especially if one has limited knowledge of the subject. Line drawings are crisp and many photos appear exceptionally sharp. Of pure joy to jaded WW II students, most of the material contained in this volume will be ‘new,’ an exciting concept in this day of information overloading as a way of life and seeing the same photos in book after book after….

 Regrettably, the scale modeler is incredibly poorly served on the subject of Regia Marina ships. Though the Cavour and Duilio classes were as well reconstructed as any dreadnoughts and the Littorio Class is quite as 1940- modern, good looking…and comparably armed to (especially European) contemporaries, one must search far and wide to find a kit of Roma, Littorio or Vittorio Veneto, let alone Cesare  or Doria…thank Heaven for the resin cottage industries!

 Most readily available is a Revell Miniships Roma in 1:1200, hardly a ‘satisfying’ build for most. As is kit industry-Teutonic-obsession-usual with the endless Tiger tanks and Focke-Wulfs and Waffen-SS figures dominating the armour, aircraft and figure shelves of hobby stores and pages of net-based suppliers, Bismarck kits dominate the ship kit sections. Regia Marina (the resin ship model company) produced a really excellent 1/700 resin Littorio (‘saw one built up as Vittorio Veneto and it looks great!)

 Pity the paucity of Italian BB kits, as in this writer / historian / modeler’s most heartfelt opinion, as some of the world’s last-built battleships, a 1/350 (or at minimum, 1/700) Littorio, Vittorio Veneto  and Roma seem ‘naturals’ for kitmakers Italeri and Tamiya and certainly deserve high-pressure styrene kit representation.  

 Enthusiastic thumbs up for this slender volume from Bagnasco and Grossman from Pictorial Histories Publishing in Montana! Highly recommended for anyone who does WW II ships, as a valuable, concise resource on one of the world’s premiere navies of the WW II period’s capital ships. Recommended for the airplane and tank people as well, to take a good look at the capability of a relatively small nation’s armaments industry. This book is a winner, on several parallel points:

·        Excellent not-seen-before period photos

·        Precise plans and drawings, fine cover-art

·        Prodigious amount of detail information in the text

·        Outstanding value for the money.

 

Review copy courtesy of the reviewer’s chequebook, purchased from Hobbytown, Oak Park, Illinois, USA

{author site updated October 2005}  (see Scott Van Aken's m2 and other reviews of James Hood's novel Adventure--Into The Neverland, of exploring a parallel, Alternate world (concept based on the Superstring theory of physics) using WW II surplus ships, aircraft and vehicles at:)    <http://users3.ev1.net/~bjmonkeyandcj/James_Hood.htm>

Book can be ordered at <http://www.authorhouse.com/BookStore/SearchCatalog.aspx>  or from your local bookstore (ISBN 0-7596-9062-6 Hardbound or ISBN-0-7596-2646-4 Softcover)

M2 Book review #  37