Stay In the Fight!! : Warrior's Guide To The Combat Pistol
Folks out there may be familiar with Kyle's Green Eyes and Black Rifles book which was a great rifle resource, and now as a great follow up, Stay In The Fight really packs a punch as a combat pistol book. The author, Kyle Lamb, is one of the true been there done that operators excelling in not only combat experience, but teaching skill as well. Coming in at a beefy 378 pages, the amount covered is robust and highly appreciated. Rather than being split up in a bunch of sub-section books all you need for a solid combat pistol education is covered in this one book.
Starting with basics such as grip and presentation, Kyle writes in a direct and easy to understand style I appreciate. Occasionally he'll even sneak in a little comedy to counteract the typically dry subject. The layout and font choices are simple and effective. Being a design guy I see some room for improvement here and there, but overall solid. The vast majority of the pictures are labeled which helps a lot deciphering what all is going on. All of the interior pictures are black and white, I'm assuming to keep costs down. Color is always a plus, but no knowledge is lost due to being black and white and I'm betting most buyers will be fine with black and white rather than raised price. After completing the basics, other great subjects are covered such as pistol related gear, operation with support hand only, advanced shooting positions, and even mindset. Many times multiple techniques are presented to let the shooter have more options and decide for themselves what works best for them. When speaking of "don'ts" Kyle takes the time to say why which is very important to me when trying to fully understand concepts and to diagnose future issues. Be sure and check out the table of contents photo to see all topics covered. When you have a job that includes the possibility of having to shoot people, the advanced portions are very important, yet sadly commonly absent in other books.
Having trained with Viking Tactics before it is a pleasure to see nothing is dumbed down in this book. The Intel inside is the same potent training as a full on class. Of course an in person class will be an enhanced learning experience, however Stay In The Fight offers great bang for the buck. The key is certainly being able to find range time to exercise all the topics covered to really put the knowledge into practice. That said, a huge amount can still be accomplished practicing dry fire. Stay in The Fight is structured specifically for combat pistol and not competition / target shooting so you need not worry about techniques being presented that only work when you are sitting behind a bench with a sandbag handy.
It may sound cliche', but hands down I think this book is the most current and comprehensive tactical pistol book currently available on the public market. The classics, hence the name are really starting to show their age and typically don't come close in terms of complete subject coverage. Highly recommended:
http://www.vikingtactics.com/books_stayinfight.html
