This is Ampersand’s second aviation book, both in the Visual History Series, and follows the same format as David Doyle’s “Flying Wings”. Ampersand got their start in 1993 when Pat Stansell distributed a free issue of Military Miniatures in Review at the IPMS Nationals in Atlanta. Ampersand joined forces with HobbyLink Japan in 2008 and have continued to expand their military AFV publications ever since. 2015 saw Ampersand dive into aviation books and 2016 marks their first dive into nautical books with the Visual History Series on the USS California. True to the series name, the focus of this book in on the visual with a mere two pages detailing the development history of the Peacemaker. A third page depicts the development of the B-36 with line drawings, and then it’s off to the well captioned photographs. I counted 50 color pictures and 181 black and white photographs. David Doyle also employs drawings where appropriate to highlight details.

The Table of Contents focuses on the following sections:

• The Consolidated B-36
• Development of the B-36
• Engine Data (Table)
• XB-36
• XC-99
• B-36A
• B-36 Serial Numbers (Table)
• B-36B
• B-36C
• B-36D
• RB-36D
• RB-36E
• B-36F
• B-36 Comparison (Table)
• RB-36F
• GRB-36F
• B-36H
• NB-36H
• RB-36H
• B-36J
• YB-60

Whether this is your first book on the Consolidated B-36, or if you have a complete collection of everything that has been printed, this is a beautiful book to have. There are some great action shots, especially of the FICON project where the GRB-36F carried the Republic EF-84E Thunderjet as well as the RF-84K. Another set of photographs depict the B-36F that carried the B-58 structural test article to Wright-Patterson for static testing. The large clear photographs with interesting captions makes this a great reference book. Highly recommended!

My thanks to The Ampersand Group, Inc. and IPMS/USA for the chance to review this great book.