Street Smart Gun Book (Paperback)

by John Farnam (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Police Bookshelf (September 1986)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0936279060
• ISBN-13: 978-0936279060
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.8 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,923,055 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Emphasis on mental aspects, August 9, 2004

By	Seppo Vesala (Helsinki, - Finland) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is the tactics book by renowned shooting instructor John Farnam. In his other books, he concentrates on selecting and handling shotguns and handguns, but this book is entirely on tactics and mental aspects of a self defence situations.

The book starts with awareness and mental preparation. Farnam stresses that it is paramount to make your mind on how to react in a certain situations, before they actually occur. After that, there is a small chapter on tactics, before moving on to mental and legal aftermath of a shooting. After that, there is a chapter on techniques and concepts on how to act in close confrontations. There is also chapters on low-light shooting, carrying a handgun concealed, range safety, and selecting a self defence firearm.

I was somewhat surprised, how little emphasis Farnam gives to actual tactics. There is much more discussion about mental aspects connected with self defence shootings. As Farnam is a shooting instructor, there is very little discussion on other solutions to a self defence situation than shooting. As they say, when all you have is a hammer, every problem starts looking like a nail. And besides that, Farnam has somewhat pessimistic view on humans' mental ability to survive untouched through a traumatic event.

The layout and production of the book leaves something to be desired. The chapters are not separated very clearly from each other, as there are only few empty lines before a new chapter, and the font used in the title of chapters does not differ very much from the font used in sub-chapters. The quality of printing is substandard, as some pictures are smudgy, and sometimes the text is similar than you can get when printing with a printer with low ink.

The book is almost 20 years old, but this does not show very clearly in the book. Only in the chapter on weapon selection, the age of the book is apparent. Farnam writes with ease, making the book pleasure to read.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Totall unusable, May 19, 2007

By	Patrick R. Lambert (Longmont, CO USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The author seems to know VERY little about what he writes. For example:

He defines cover and concealment correctly but then makes statements like a trash can makes good cover (concealment but NOT cover). He then further says that the sheet metal in the door of a car will stop a handgun bullet or reduce it to non lethal velocities - TOTALLY UNTRUE!

I want my money back!