Osprey Publishing is best known for its long running series of illustrated military history books. Over the last forty years, Osprey has covered every era of warfare from the earliest recorded battles in Ancient Egypt right up to today’s Special Forces.

Modellers, role-players, wargamers, authors, and even professors have all used our books as reference tools.

For the last seven years, I have been lucky enough to work for Osprey Publishing, and although my job has changed greatly over the years, my enthusiasm for our products has not.

Even for someone like myself, that comes out of a fantasy role-play and writing background, I find Osprey has a lot to offer. So, when John suggested I write a blog about some of the interesting books coming up from Osprey, I jumped at the chance.

Now, Osprey has over 100 books coming out this year, so there isn’t time to talk about them all.

Instead, I thought I might just highlight a few that I thought would be of particular interest to Black Gate readers. So here we go…

Probably my favorite series from Osprey over the last few years has been RAID. These books tell the story of small unit actions and aren’t necessarily limited to the strict confines of military history.

For example, two titles coming up in the next few months have really caught my eye.  The first is Blackbeard’s Last Fight: Pirate Hunting in North Carolina 1718.

Being born and raised a Tarheel, I’ve heard about Edward Teach (aka Blackbeard) all my life, and my interest hit a new high after reading Tim Power’s On Stranger Tides, but I’ve never read the full story of his demise.

With all the new information that has (literally) come up in the last few years after the discovery of one Blackbeard’s ships in the Outer Banks, this should be a good one.

And look at that artwork, you can’t seriously resist a face like that?

Get more information at the Osprey Publishing website.

Coming out in the same month in the same series is Tombstone: Wyatt Earp, the O.K. Corral, and the Vendetta Ride 1881-82.

If you’ve seen the movie, Tombstone, you know how cool a story this is. Although the O.K. Corral is probably the most famous shootout in US history, it is really only one piece of the story of the Earp brothers’ fight against the Cowboys.

Well, here’s the whole, true story, and it is just as filled with long dusters, sawed-off shotguns, and great moustaches as the movie version.  Okay, it doesn’t have Val Kilmer, but Doc Holiday is an intriguing enough character in his own right.

More info at the Osprey site here.

In the last few years, Osprey has been branching out into miniature wargaming, printing our own series of wargame rules. Just last month, we released a new set of Steampunk rules called In Her Majesty’s Name.

In this game, each player controls an ‘Adventuring Company’ of around 8 to 12 models. These can be British Redcoats with their hi-tech gadgetry, Prussians with their zombie forces, Egyptian cultists, Chinese mystics, and many, many more.

The game has officially sold out, but is still available from many retailers, and we are printing more as we speak. The game even has an official line of miniatures to accompany it, available from North Star Military Figures.

Learn more — you guessed it — at Osprey Publishing here.

See the miniatures at northstarfigures.com.

Drifting even further away from real history, coming in June is The Nazi Occult, written by acclaimed role-playing author Kenneth Hite.

Although the Indiana Jones movies brought the combination of Nazis and weird magic to the general public, the idea had been around for a long time.

In this book, Kenneth brings all of the history and different conspiracy theories together, to form a coherent narrative of the Nazi Occult programs, filled with lots of great illustrations. I challenge anyone to unravel where exactly the history ends and the fiction begins…

Check it out here.

Finally, for those interested in myths and legends, we’ve a great title that has just been released, The War of Horus and Set.

This book tells the complete story of the feud between the Egyptian brother gods Horus and Osiris, and the resultant war after Horus murders his brother. The original sources for this story are a real mess, and the author has done a great job of untangling it and presenting it in a flowing, entertaining manner.

The book also gives all of the historical background of the story, showing how real events in Egyptian history influenced how the story was told.  What is really amazing to me about this book is how the artist, Mark Stacey, has managed to make Horus, a god with the head of an Aardvark, look tough.

Learn all about it here.

Well, that’s all I’ve got time for at the moment, but if people are interested, I’ll pop back in a month or two, with another look at what is coming out.

In the meantime, if you want to check out everything coming from Osprey, it’s all up on the website: www.ospreypublishing.com