This is the twelfth book in their Monograph series and covers the F4F Wildcat. In line with the others in the series, there is a full historical background, followed by a combat history. A section on the various camouflage schemes carried by the Wildcat is next and then page after page of excellent drawings and three-views in 1/48 with some in 1/32 scale.

Included in this section are drawings that show the development of the airframe in terms of what changed from one variant to the next. This includes not only the usual fuselage stuff, but also those changes in the wings as the armament fluctuated.

A small section of color photos of a rather ratty and incorrectly painted FM-2 warbird is next and then there are many pages of excellent color profiles.

Along with the rest of the books, this is a dual Polish/English publication. The English portion of it is excellent without any of the syntax errors that were so common in the past. The photos that are included are well done, though still not up to snuff. Let me explain. Previous books had captions that were poorly written and often had nothing to do with the photo subject. This has, for the most part, been fixed. There are still a few glitches, such as an FM-2 crashing aboard one of the light carriers  that is correctly identified in some pictures, but one of the same sequence is noted as being damaged by Japanese fighters and crashing aboard the Yorktown. There is also the condition that the images shown usually have little to do with the write-up. It is like 'Ok, we have 100 pictures. Just start putting them in where there is space'. There are pictures of British Martlets a dozen pages before we get to that section. While in that section on Martlets, the photos are of FM-2s in the Pacific. I'm thinking that there was a rush to get to press and that the photo situation wasn't very thoroughly thought out. This has been so typical of the USN aircraft books that Kagero has done in this series.

The decals that are provided are in both 1/72 and 1/48 scale. Generally they are code letters and a few unit badges as Navy planes are usually pretty standard. 11 aircraft are covered from all times during the Wildcat's operational history other than the 'yellow wings' period. One Martlet in D-Day stripes is included in the mix. The decals are very nicely printed by Techmod. No longer is there a little 'pouch' to hold the decals inside the front cover as in previous books. Apparently this is a cost cutting measure as I found them to be quite handy.

Overall, I'd have to say that this is a pretty good book. Aside from the photos situation, the historical background is first rate and the drawings and decals easily make this book worth the cover price.

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