Know your man

Press, 28 August 1979, Page 1 (Supplement)

Know your man

For the man who doesn’t smoke, doesn’t use shaving cream, has given up polishing his car, has enough hankies, and already has 10 bottles of after-shave lotion untouched, buying something for Father’s Day can be a problem.

But there are always books. Books of all kinds, shapes, sizes, and prices. Unfortunately books, like everything else, are not cheap, particularly if they are the sort designed to grace coffee tables, but there are many books that are good value for money. Unless you know well the tastes of your man, and have a close knowledge of what he has been reading lately, buying fiction is risky. If he is an avid reader of fiction the chances are that he has read the latest thriller, or he doesn’t care for the style of the author who has been plugged on TV for the last few weeks. Also most modern fiction works are “oncers.” Once you have read them you are unlikely to bother to read them again. In fact many people don’t even bother to keep much fiction; preferring to give a $3 paperback away rather than have it cluttering up valuable space on the bookshelf. So books on factual subjects are usually much safer gifts. They will probably cost more, but members of a family could club together to buy Father one $lO book which would probably be more appreciated than two or three lesser items.

The range of topics cov-

ered in books is infinite; think of a topic and you will find a book on it. There are books on anything from growing apples to starting zoos — the big difficulty is making a choice.

Here again you need to know your man. If he has been a keen woodworker for 20 years it is little use buying him a book on elementary carpentry, or if he has been a life-long gardener he would not have much use for a book on identifying common weeds.

If your man is interested in the different forms of transport — aircraft, boats, cars, trains — you’re lucky. The range of books on these is tremendous. Some elaborate books on these topics can be very expensive, but not al! are.

A series on display in at least one Christchurch bookstore is “The Love of” series pyblished by Octopus Books, Ltd, London.

One of the cheapest in this series is “Sailing,” by Douglas Phillips-Birt, at $7.95. It has less than 100 pages but all its 120 photographs are in colour. It deals briefly but adequately with early sailing boats, the “Tall Ships,” class racing, dinghies, cruising yachts, ocean racing, multi-hulls, and the solo sailors.

The range of books dealing with the sea and boats is huge and even if the reader knows nothing about the technicalities of boats there are many books of general interest, such as “A World of My

Own,” by Robin KnoxJohnston, who made the first solo non-stop voyage around the world, or if your man is an armchair masochist, “Ice Bird,” by David Lewis, an account of a fateful solo-voyage to the Antarctic.

For descriptions of more comfortable voyages the best are those by Eric Hiscock, the doyen of yachting writers, who has visited New Zealand waters several times. “Before the Wind” (Reed) is a New Zealand yachting anthology giving a comprehensive picture of local yachting over the years. Octopus Books also publish a “Pictorial History of Cars,” by Peter Roberts. At $9.95 it seems good value, with 191 pages, many good colour pictures and drawings and a clear text. Much more lavish is the “History of the Motor Car,” with 375 pages, 707 illustrations — 485 in colour, at $15.95. Hard for a car enthusiast to resist.

“Aviation,” the story of man’s conquest of the air, is a good buy at $9.95. Still up in the air, only much higher as far as price goes, is a “History of Aviation” by John W. R. Taylor and Kenneth Munson, editors and compilers of the Bible of of aircraft-lovers — Jane’s “All the World’s Aircraft.” The “History of Aviation” costs $24.95 and has 1500 illustrations.

The railway enthusiast will find plenty to occupy him in the “Encyclopedia of Railways” edited by O. S. Nock at $19.95. Another Octopus publication.