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Tip and Run: The Untold Tragedy of the Great War in Africa | 
 enlarge | Author: Edward Paice
Publisher: Phoenix
Category: Book
List Price: £12.99
Buy New: £4.77
You Save: £8.22 (63%)
New (16) Used (8) from £4.50
Rating:  4 reviews
Sales Rank: 34961
Media: Paperback
Pages: 560
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.3 x 1.7
ISBN: 0753823497
EAN: 9780753823491
ASIN: 0753823497
Publication Date: February 14, 2008
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand new, in stock. Shipped from the UK by First Class Royal Mail service in eco-friendly packaging.
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| Customer Reviews:
 A fascinating story told in a strangely standard way May 20, 2008
J. Duducu (Ruislip)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Firstly I admire the amount of research that has gone into this book. I am also impressed that an important part of the understanding of the First World War has been resurrected with this work.
Tip and Run is the story of East Africa from 1914 to 1918 and how this quiet colonial area was turned, quite unnecessarily, into a war zone. It has moments of high drama and tragedy along with stories of daring-do and even some comedy. It is a sober reminder that yet again considering the whole war experience as sitting in a trench in Belgium is unrealistic and quite a modern interpretation of the actual events.
Where this book trips up is the fact that all the maps are in the front so you are continually having to flick backwards and forwards and the narrative assumes you know which map you should be looking at which is annoying. Also as the author keeps reminding you of the huge scale of the areas covered it's almost an unforgiveable oversight.
Secondly I think Edward Paice has got a little too caught up in this colonial age. Some of the writing sounds almost Victorian, I can almost hear him narrating through a big bushy walrus moustache. Read the opening paragraph to chapter 2 (phoney war) to see what I mean. Just because you are writing about a specific time and place doesn't mean you have to mimic it. When you compare this to the styles of the likes of Niall Ferguson or Tom Holland it's almost archaic.
Finally this is an area of history most people won't know anything about so why pre-empt every battle or raid by telling us if it was a success or failure? It some what undermines the narrative and almost encourages you to skip parts.
So overall this is a very interesting book that tells you about an area of WW1 you are unlikely to know much about. the information is 4 or 5 stars, it's just a shame the style and maps let it down as an overall read.
WW1 in Africa July 20, 2007
Ivor Gardiner (UK)
17 out of 18 found this review helpful
Of all the various campaigns and theatres from WW1, I have always found the "sideshows" in Africa and the Middle East the most fascinating and manoeuvrist, and of those the African campaigns the most interesting. I have read a number of books on the campaign in East Africa, and this is by far the best researched and most flowing and well written yet. It goes into just the right levels of detail without becoming dry and turgid, as some accounts do.
I have only two complaints with this book. For a start, for a campaign covering so much ground and with small forces so widely dispersed, I felt the supporting maps could have provided a lot more clarity; which they did not. The second point is the misnomer within the title, reference the "Untold Tragedy of the War in Africa" bit. This book was fundamentally about the campaign in East Africa, and within the covers does not even create the pretence of being concerned with German SWA, rebellion in SA, the Cameroons etc. This is a pity, as I am still looking for a book written in the style of Tip and Run which covers the whole of Africa in WW1, and the title here is misleading.
Having said all that, it is an excellent and highly recommended read, and but for these two points I would have scored it 5 stars.
 forgotten war January 25, 2007
H. Julian (turin)
22 out of 34 found this review helpful
In Britain the campaign was given little importance except for the need to crush the German naval bases in Africa. To other powers with frustrated colonial ambitions in there it was different. Two weeks after the Armistice was signed in Europe British and German troops were still fighting in Africa after four years of what one campaign historian described as 'a war of extermination and attrition without parallel in modern times'.
The expense of the campaign to the British Empire was immense, the Allied and German 'butchers bills' even greater. But the most tragic consequence of the two sides' deadly game was the devastation of an area five times the size of Germany, and civilian suffering on a scale unimaginable in Europe. Such was the cost of 'The White Man's Palaver', the final phase of the European conquest of Africa. See the film The African Queen (memorably filmed with Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn)
Campaign in East Africa January 15, 2007
Michael MCCARTHY (Hampshire UK)
36 out of 39 found this review helpful
For those of us who tend to focus our attention on the Western Front this exposition of one of the African fronts is quite an eye opener, and it will probably become the core reference for the East African front in the Great War.
It explains in detail the political dynamics and the military responses over four years of battle.
The book is very well researched and written in an informative, authoritative but most readable style. The characters emerge as people dealing with the realities of fighting as a `sideshow' to the main events in Europe, but no less important in terms of the global impact.
The index, sources and bibliography are excellent and encourage careful reading. Also it is blessed with good maps, particularly of the individual battlefields.
As seems to be the case in wars in Africa, the campaign in East Africa left only one major loser; the Africans. The point is well made in this book which is recommended.
Mike McCarthy
Editor, "The Battle Guide"
Guild of Battlefield Guides
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