Customer Reviews

Boston's Gun Bible

5 star:		(139)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Boston's Gun Bible stands alone as the very best all-around reference for firearms owners. Not only does it cover practical rifles, pistols, and shotguns in detail, but it has a wealth of valuable information on related subjects such as optics, practical carry, training, legal issues, and legislative issues. The new expanded and updated edition (with 200 extra pages) is fantastic!

This weighty tome is an absolute MUST for all gun owners. At $28 it isn't cheap, but as I stated before in reviewing the previous edition, it is worth every penny.

Boston's observations and conclusions about guns are precisely researched, scientific, and relatively dispassionate. Unlike many other writers in the firearms field, Boston has consistently shown that he is willing to change his mind when presented with logical evidence.

This is a book that may very well save the life of yourself or a loved one. It is also a highly influential book that may contribute in the long run to the restoration of our Constitutional Republic and freedom around the world. Boston's Gun Bible doesn't just whine about the decline of our God-given Constitutional liberties. Rather, it shows practical solutions that individual Citizens can and must take to insure the liberty of future generations. It is nothing short of a monumental work of non-fiction!

Don't just buy one copy. Buy two! You will soon find that you'll need an extra copy to lend out to family members and friends.

OBTW, if you already have the older edition, then I strongly suggest that you buy the new expanded and updated edition. This valuable new information is well worth the investment.

As a published fiction writer, I stand in awe of this important piece of non-fiction. It deserves a place of honor on the bookshelf of every freedom-loving Citizen.

Semper Paratus,>Author of the pro-gun novel "Patriots:Surviving the Coming Collapse."

If you are involved in an aspect of arms ownership that is not completely relegated to target/hunting matters, then this is the book to give that person. One problem with defensive/offensive arms and their handling, is that the entire industry of munitions as available to the U.S. civilian is made of junk, useless junk, non functioning junk, and the occassional gem. While Boston may be able to tell you in one sentence why rifle XXX is way inferior ro rifle YYY, but in this book, first and foremost, he explains WHY one is inferior. Then the 'why' is placed in the context of the legal availability of certain weapons. And from that is distilled the cream. the cream being the best available to the civilian under current regulations. If these implements are going to be such that 'you would bet your life on them' only the cream will do. You get a little 'combat rifle history' which will make you understand the importance of proper control placement, and why a rifle was designed a certain way. While the book will not nail on the head the only things you should buy, what the book will do is allow you to eliminate 90% of what is not feasible and otherwise junk. The T&E of weaponry takes up the largest part of the book. There is also a large section concering handguns and handgun ammo. I thought rifle ammo was neglected. ALso the statement that 'SS109 5.56 is a major improvement over 55 graim ball' is now proven to be wrong by its performance in Afghanistan. You then have a section on sniper rifle choice. OUt of 300 available calibers you are honed down to perhaps 10. An artcile on .50 cals. .50 Cal ammo. Night vision, I actually learned the difference between various Gen. devices. Scopes. Really every conceivable piece of fighting gear is touched upon. That is why if you read this book, you will eliminate 90% of whats out there from your vision. There are philosophical sections on the warrior mentality, philosophy, shooting, these make entertaining reading. In all, there is no book like this, and it is worth every penny but it is not the end of knowledge, it is the beginning. In other words, even though you may have narrowed your search for a tactical scope down to 10 models, you must then fill in the rest of the picture about the 10 and how they work and then train, train, and train some more.

I do have one caveat. The author is obviously and tremendously trained in almost all aspects of martial arts. Yes, shooting is a martial art too. However, to my knowlegde, and Boston makes no reference to it in anything I have read by him, that he has taken down an oppenent with karate, knife, etc., or had someone in his custody and 'under his gun', much less shot anyone or been shot at. Its not like I have either, but if Boston has one weakness, it is this. No practical combat experience. You might want to balance his book with other material by bona fide veterans, etc.

Boston's Gun Bible, written by Kenneth W. Royce, is scholarly and philosophical, as well as passionate, political and technical. It is no accident that Mr. Royce cites the ultra-science fiction/political satire, Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon, as "one of the five best novels I have ever read". Like Stephenson's book (Stephenson is postmodern Melville) Royce's "Bible" is a collage, a pastiche, a rich simmering brew of humor, ideas, opinions, cant, rant and instruction.

Given the book's patchwork style, I think it best to review it according to themes. There are three I will consider: 1. Technical Aspects of Firearms; 2. Philosophy of Firearms;
3. Politics. Other themes which are thoughtfully developed in the 848 page book are on the laws governing gun use, women and guns, self-defense, tactics and training, combat rifle history and how to become a rifleman.

The Technical discussion is one of the strongest sections. I came to this book as a complete newbie as far as firearms are concerned. But the technical part of the book rewards careful reading. It is a complete and meticulously considered course on firearms - how to buy them, how to evaluate them, how they work, how to keep them working, etc. Of the 46 chapters in the book 22 are devoted to this one topic. In his sections evaluating various rifles and pistols, Mr. Royce, using a system he devised, rates dozens of rifles and pistols. His system employs "63 criteria...to rate the controls, features and specifications of combat rifles." And while it is true his full system is deployed only against rifles, the system itself is an extremely useful tool for evaluating any firearm, and also comparing firearms among themselves within distinct classes

The Philosophical aspect of the book is as difficult and convoluted as the Technical part is straightforward. On the one hand, this is in the nature of philosophy. On the other, the difficulty has to do with the purpose and meaning of guns in human culture. This topic has no Socrates (unless it is Nietzsche), and Mr. Royce in this book provides what is only a rudimentary outline. (In his other books, none of which I have read, he may articulate more fully his philosophical arguments.) Mr. Royce's view of human society is that it consists of a very large number of sheep-like beings, who are preyed upon by a few rapacious predators and/or bad governments. He seeks to lay out a third position: "those who refuse to be either", and offers as an example, "an armed libertarian".

The core values of the Third Way are the values of the Warrior, and in any number of ways, Mr. Royce drapes the term Warrior in the full regalia of an ancient and venerable tradition. By denying the Warrior as predator (Mr. Royce's Warrior is no berserker, no pirate, no storm trooper and no imperialist) he evokes a sterner, more finely tempered kind of life, where honor, personal responsibility and concern for others hold pride of place. Human life is intrinsically a life of struggle, and in Mr. Royce's view, a person can accept the reality of this and learn to fight, or he can flee this responsibility, outright by becoming prey, or indirectly by delegating his role to other "protectors". Unfortunately, as any reading of history will attest, the protectors all too often themselves become the predators. Only the Warrior, living a value imbued life that explicitly eschews violent domination of others, can move beyond the predator/prey cycle. The state for which the Warrior strives is that of liberty, and the life of liberty in human societies is moved by four forces, symbolized as the soap box (discussion), the ballot box (formulation), the jury box (interpretation) and the cartridge box (decisive action). In the real world, the first three do not exist in a substantive way without the fourth. And for that reason, firearms - "liberty's teeth"-are the necessary though not sufficient conditions to resist servitude.

The Political themes of this book are the most passionate, and the least organized, of all.
Royce very rightly champions the second amendment as not only the safeguard of the right of each individual to keep firearms but the major bulwark against evil doers and tyrannous governments. Scattered throughout the book are many statistics concerning the relationship between gun ownership and crime. Just in case you are wondering, when a society is armed, there is less crime. Any society which disarms its citizens AND maintains a low rate of crime, does so only by sacrificing many of what we still regard as fundamental human rights (i.e. Japan).

With respect to tyrannical governments, Mr. Royce's arguments are not convincing, at least to me. Certainly, he does have history on his side. "Death by government" was a central motif of the twentieth century, and many previous centuries as well. People would do well to be wary of governments. They would do well to be prepared to take action against tyrannous governments. The question is, Do Americans now face such tyranny? Has the time come to step off the soap box, batten down the ballot box, burn the jury box and open the cartridge box? Mr. Royce is convinced that such a time is imminent, but his arguments in this direction are flimsy. The Political side of the book does not answer to the Philosophical side.

This is a strong book, which I recommend most highly for anyone who is interested in firearms, and who wishes to learn more about any of the themes I have outlined. Owning and using guns is a method which, in mature use, inspires careful reflection, as well as considered action.

I bought this book thinking it would merely be a handy reference on firearms, so I was utterly floored by its unexpected intensity and passion. Rather than just giving you the "how", it serves up a healthy dose of the "why" as well. This deeply American book should be required reading for everyone. The writing is lucid and honest, at times funny, and the lessons are indisputable. The citizen disarmament advocates use hype and emotion to further their cause. BTP's Gun Bible meticulously dismantles their rhetoric with facts and reason. I challenge "gun control" advocates to read this book and walk away with your convictions intact.

Yes, I disagree with Boston on a couple minor technical points (and was proud to see my "contribution" on Aimpoint optics in the latest edition), but being active-duty Army, this is the only civilian weapons book I make room in the bags for when deploying overseas. When our battalion was issued M14 rifles from storage, the class I gave on iron-sight zero procedures came right out of BGB. I'm on my third copy as it keeps growing legs, and bought copies for some of my soldiers as welcome-home gifts.

BTW, the M855/SS109 is better and punching holes in things, but you're correct in that its inferior on soft tissue. When possible here, I followed SOCOM's lead ans scrounged some Black Hills match grade 5.56 loaded with the 77 grain Sierra. Works great if you don't have an M14 handy.

I was very excited to read this book. Based on the reviews, I knew that I shared most of the author's leanings on both politics and rifles.

On the plus side, Boston's Gun Bible contains tons of great information that can't be found in any other single volume that I've come across so far. When it comes to gear, this guy really knows his stuff. For that reason alone, I think it's a worthwhile book for any proud `gun nut' (like me); I don't regret the purchase and I intend on keeping the book.

That said, the book does suffer from some flaws in three areas that kept it from being as pleasurable of a read as I expected. The net result is that one has to wade through a fair amount of unfocused venting in order to glean the worthwhile information that the book does in fact contain. The flaws in question are haphazard organization, historical errors of fact and analysis*, and writing quality that I can best describe as C-.

Since it looks like all three of these problem areas have been addressed by previous reviews, I'm only going to discuss the one that I found most distracting: the author's lackluster writing skills. Perhaps I'm being abnormally picky here, but still, I think Jeff Cooper for one would agree with me on the value of good, technically correct, clear prose.

There are the usual suspects - bad grammar and typos - throughout; I often wondered whether a competent editor had ever looked at Mr. Party's manuscript. In addition, some of the author's New-Speak-like jargon seems clever at first, but rapidly gets annoying after a couple dozen pages.

By far the most annoying thing, though, is (as a prior reviewer noted) Mr. Party's constant changes in fonts, especially his ridiculous overuse of italics. When you only occasionally use italics, their intended effect - emphasis of a crucial word or phrase - comes across clearly, and everybody is happy. However, when you use italics too much, as I believe Mr. Party does, it eventually stops having the desired effect, and instead creates the effect in the reader's head that the author suffers from some kind of voice-modulation disorder. I found it very distracting.

One can only imagine how much better this book might have been if Mr. Party had also, in between all the firearms classes he's attended, taken the time to attend a writing seminar or two.

*One historical problem I can't resist mentioning: Mr. Party essentially doubles the actual number of Soviet KIA from the Afghan War; moreover, he wrongly attributes these & the resultant Soviet defeat there primarily to the Afghans' skill with the 303 British bolt rifle. In reality, the Afghans were losing the war until American aid arrived in the form of better weapons (more modern rifles, heavy machineguns and artillery, mines, and, most crucially, the Stinger missile which neutralized the Hind gunship threat.)

I purchased this book soon after reading the author's first work of fiction, Molon Labe, and I couldn't be more happy with the purchase. Given all the gun media out there that competes for your reading dollar, this is about the best $20 i've spent in some time. Gun Magazines all make their livelihoods selling advertising to gun manufacturers and thus, their reviews tend to sugar-coat flaws. Not so with Boston! His evaluations are unbiased and cut like a razor. Had I bought this book before I purchased my $1400 Armalite AR-10A4 that jams at least a round or two per mag regardless of the ammo/mag, I would have saved a good deal of money and bought a FAL or M1A to start with. The book lives up to its title in that it is a compendium of hands-on researched and empirically analyzed information about firearms for all purposes, with an emphasis on home defense and defense of Liberty in general. I have read and reread the book so many times in the last 4 months that I expect I'll need to replace it soon. The poor thing is starting to fall apart; it's that solid of a reference.

Other reviewers have gone in depth to explain the contents of the books so I will not duplicate their work. However, I find it helpful to mention the three sections that have been the most useful to my interests. I was interested in purchasing a full power battle rifle (308) to replace my jamming AR-10 but given the costs involved, Boston's complete evalations of all the major battle rifles (AR-10, FAL, HK91, M1, M1A, AR-15, Steyr AUG, AK-47, AK-74) were invaluable in helping me to select a DSA Para FAL that fills my needs and goes bang every time I pull the trigger. The second area that was very useful for me was the surplus ammunition evaluation. Nowhere else have I found a solid accuracy evaluation of various types of available surplus ammuntion for 308, 223, and 50 BMG surplus projectiles. Given a battle rifle's appetite for ammunition and Boston's maxim "Ammunition turns money into skill", information ranking the accuracy of surplus ammo in various rifles alone justifies the cost of this volume. Lastly, a section of the book has a solid evaluation of the items needed and costs of getting into 50 BMG target rifle shooting. Boston provides a full evaluation of what is required (rangefinders, ammo, reloading, optics) as well as ranking rifle models previously unheard of by me and most "gun-guys". While the book definitely doesn't discourage one from purchasing a 50 BMG rifle, the text is definitely an eye-opener that these behemoths aren't for everyone, especially those without a well-rooted money tree.

Overall, Boston's Gun Bible is a very solid book (and an exceptional value) for both the novice interested in purchasing their first defensive handgun or hunting rifle to the experienced enthusiast looking to thoughtfully fill up their gun safe. Should you buy it outside Amazon, be sure to get the current edition which has been updated since the 1994 "Krime Bill" expired. The version offered here on Amazon.com as a New Book is the updated edition.

Well, probably a .25 or .22.

Where to start? OK...This book has both quality AND quantity. Great bang for the buck in these times of everything costing more, and books costing even more than that.

Boston's books all have a sense of urgency that would turn into ranting in many writers' hands. But this is avoided by Boston's keen sense of organization (both on the page and out in the world, he *is* the FSW founder), combined with pretty damn good proofreading, editing and page layout, especially compared with most small press fare.

And the man can *write*. While he obviously thinks a mile a second, he still manages to get it all down in a polished way.

Being that I am a recovering liberal who used to be afraid of guns, I found this book quite an eye opener. It's not just about guns, though the gun stuff is covered and then some. (If you just want books about guns, period, there are plenty of good gun books, Massad Ayoob has written many.)

Boston's Gun Bible is very short on shotgun info (though the line about "condo beehivers and drywall" was hilarious), and not too heavy on revolvers, but Boston likes rifles and semi-autos. This is probably the best rifle book extant. And Boston doesn't cover much on shotguns and revolvers because he "writes what he knows", and he knows what he loves. He loves rifles.

If you want a shotgun book, I recommend "Modern Shotgunning" by Dave Henderson. It's detailed and sweet. Sort of feels like a knowledgeable grandpa passing on his life experience with hunting. Boston's Gun Bible feels more like it's written by your crazy uncle, who it turns out isn't crazy after all. Maybe the crazy uncle is really the only sane guy in the family, because he really understands how the world really works.

Reading this book is a direct pineal download (yes, you'll lose sleep) to the true spirit of the men who created America, men who spoke their constitution with arms. Arms not as symbols, but as actual TOOLS.

In these exponentially turbulent times where America is becoming a welfare state and a foreign country (and that includes many who call themselves "true Americans"), Boston's Gun Bible will help keep your "aim true."

When I bought this book, I was just looking for a book on target shooting and home defense. I got so much more.

Guns, as with any defensive tools, are owned and practiced so hopefully we never have to use them. But an unwillingness to push back when dragged off isn't what this country was based on. And even that has become an unpopular opinion with many of the shiny happy sheeple.

Reading Boston's Gun Bible, I'm reminded of this quote from Charles A. Beard:
"It is sobering to reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the struggle for independence."
==-
MichaelNotMike

If you are going to only own one book on guns, this is it. Soup to nuts on why to own a gun, which ones to buy, what gear works, you name it. The section on U.S. gun laws is worth the price of the book alone. It's 700+ pages that doesn't gloss over anything; whether he's rating battle rifles or exploding the myths of gun control, Boston has clearly taken his time and done this one "right". A word of caution for those not familiar with Boston's work- this is not a book about hunting- it's about the true purpose of the Second Amendment clause "to keep and bear arms". You might as well go ahead and order two copies, because when you read it you're going to want to share it with friend....

Boston's Gun Bible is probably THE book every gun owner and freedom loving American should own. Few Americans truly understand the Bill of Rights and the 2nd Amendment. It's not about hunting, nor is about personal protection. First and foremost, it is to protect Americans from an overbearing government! Boston's Bible gives you the information you need to make intelligent choices in every phase of selection and use of firearms.

That said, the original edition was released in 1998. We were in the depths of the Clinton efforts to disarm Americans. He revised it in 2000 with many important updates, and revised it again in 2002, which this version happens to be. That was the last revision. A newly revised edition is sorely needed.

It's been six long years, and many important events directly bearing on firearms, their ownership and use have transpired. The gun ban expired, which opened millions to ownership of guns more evenly matched with government forces. The development of the 6.8 SPC round for combat use in Afghanistan and Iraq. Laser optics. Wartime R&D have put many new features and materials in play. New manufacturers have come; others have gone. The Supreme Court has revised laws on gun ownership. All of this needs to be accounted for in any book purporting to be a Bible. And that means timely revisions.

The other reviews here accurately reflect strengths and shortcomings of the Bible. Even as it ages, however, it is aging gracefully, and you should surely own and study religiously the most recent edition.

EDIT - ADDED COMMENT (6/30/08) - I discovered this weekend that the book has been revised and updated since it's 2002 copy right date, but because the updates are not annotated, you have no way of knowing which edition you are reading. The copy I found this weekend says, "New text for 2006" on the page facing the table of contents. In reading through sections of the book, I find comments which indicated new material. It would be most helpful if the publisher, Javelin Press, would use standard bibliographic formatting and conventions so a reader would know which date he has.