Status Update Jagdflliegerverbände Vol 9/I

[Larry Hickey]

I recently received an e-mail from Dr. Jochen Prien on the status of JFV Vol 9/I, which I thought would be of high interest to many readers of this board. With his permission, I'm quoting below the relevant information. As noted in a previous report, Vol. 9, the winter of 1941-42, will be presented in three separate volumes: 9/I to 9/III.

"...Vol. 9/I (is now) in its final corrections; it will hopefully be out by the end of May/early June. It will for the first time include colour photos, this time not only those related to the Winter War 1941/42 but all that belong to the periods dealt with so far. Altogether this will be some 50 or so colour images, maybe more. Beside that, work on the Home Defence in 1943 has started; here we will change the format insofar as the general narrative will be widely expanded and include the operations of the units, as the growing number of fighter units were mostly involved in the fighting over the Reich so that it would lead to endless and tiring repetitions if we stuck to the format used up
until now, which of course will be continued for the other theatres of
operations. The new format not only gives a much more complex reading but
also - and foremost - a much more intricate task to put it all together.
From working up through the year I can really feel how the US air offensive
over the Reich gained momentum and, at the same time, how more and more German fighter units poured into the fighting with large-scale air battles
developing in the end."

[Falcon]

In three parts... a nice way to make more money.
Since the Part 5 the books are going smaller and smaller and the price higher and higher. A bad move.

[Ruy Horta]

Just to call a halt before things get ugly.

The books haven't been published yet, so ANY criticism of the kind presented here is premature, to say the least.

Bottom line, wait until you can judge and if you don't like what you see when we get there, decide if you purchase or not.

This generally negative attitude is getting on my nerves.

To date Prien and his partners have given little or no reason to warrant such a reaction.

[Falcon]

Originally Posted by Ruy Horta

The books haven't been published yet, so ANY criticism of the kind presented here is premature, to say the least.

I talk about the books 6/I, 6/II, 7, 8/I and 8,/II that i own. And now it's sure that the band 3 comes in three parts. Yes, i dont know how mutch pages the tree parts has got. But i guess they are so small like the parts 6-8.
Compare it with band 1,2 and 5.

The books are good, thats sure. But the price/achievement get imho out of balance.

Now the band 9 will have color photos, that will be a "good" reason for the publishers/authors to get the price mutch higher. But let's see...

[John Manrho]

I can not agree with you. The biggest volume is Vol. 5 with 620 pages. If you look at that volume it is as big as you can go. The size is approx. the same as Vol. 3 and Vol. 4 of the JG 77 series. If you make the book bigger than that, you can't handle it easily and it will break up on the long run. Part I and II of Volume 8 are the smallest, part I 364 pages and part II 354 pages, that's 718 pages in total. The question would be if you want to reduce that number of pages for sake of getting it in a 620 pages volume. I want as much data as possible, so give me two volumes, or for Vol. 9 three or four volumes whatever is necessary. What do you think will happen when we come to the end of 1943 and into 1944? The scale of operations will lead to multiple volumes. If the data is there, I will pay. Of course it is up to you and other potential buyers to decide otherwise, but until now I found every volume of Jochen Prien worth the money. Regards, John.

[leonventer]

Originally Posted by John Manrho

... until now I found every volume of Jochen Prien worth the money.

I agree completely with John. Prien's series on the Jagdfliegerverbände (and all his other books, for that matter) are unique and indispensable resources. Buying the volumes as they're published (3-4 times a year) helps spread out the cost.

Leon Venter

[Tom Semenza]

You get what you pay for. The prices are especially painful for those of us in the States buying books from Europe, with the dollar being so weak against the Euro and the high cost of shipping. But Prien's series is by far the best source available on a subject which is of great interest to me. So I am willing to shell out for them and am always glad to have done so, even after the VISA bill arrives.

Such books are very expensive to produce and the audience for them is relatively small. The authors are not becoming weathly men as a result of their labors, that's for sure.

Tom Semenza

[Larry Hickey]

I think my post on this subject might have been a little misleading. The entire JFV Vol 9 (sections I-III) does not cover just the winter war 1941-42. The post that I made on Feb. 4th, better describes what Dr. Prien has in mind for Vol. 9, with the three separate parts (books):

"As things are right now, Vol. 9 will have to be broken up into three parts, the sheer mass of victory lists bursting the usual frame. 9/I...will deal with the Winterwar 1941 /42 up to April 30th, 1942, whereas 9/II and III will center around the summer offensive 1942 until the defeat at Stalingrad on February 3rd, 1943. As a sort of Appendix in part III we will have to cover JG 5 in Northern Norway and Finland, which had no real connection to the fighting along the rest of the Eastern Front."

I hope that this clarifies things for those of you who missed my original post on this subject.

Regarding the cost of these volumes, yes, they are expensive, especially outside the EU. But these are published in small production runs and, I believe, are being financed by Dr. Prien himself. I'm quite sure that he doesn't make money on these volumes. He once commented to me that the whole JFV series was initially his attempt to organize his very large 109 photo collection. All of us have benefited tremendously from his efforts, and those of the researchers who are working with him on the project. I believe that the series is now scheduled to exceed the 13 Volumes originally planned. We already see that with the subsections being published it could easily exceed 20 separate books. I can assure you that if Dr. Prien wanted to make money, there are many endeavors he could pursue that would be far more lucrative than publishing the JFV series.

[Jim P.]

Amen to that Larry (and Tom). There are already 8 Volumes and 11 books published. Add the 3 for the Eastern Front makes 14 - and that only gets us to the end of 1942!! I'd guess that there might be at least another 10 books.

[John Beaman]

Dr Prien has offered some unique information/opportunities for those who are truly "into" Luftwaffe fighters. His Schieffer 109 book, and those published on JGs 3, 11, 27, 53 and 77 are unique: there is no comparable effort on these units' histories. The current series takes a different approach, but much more broad coverage and again offers opportunities for photos and documentation that are, apparently not available any where else. So, bottom line: what is this worth to you? Frankly, for what one gets, understanding the tremendous efforts he and his co-authors have made over many years to acquire and organize the data as has been done, the price is "priceless".

For those who complain about the price, fine: you pays your money and makes your choices in life. It is all about priorities. A couple of dinners in London, or Paris, or Berlin, or Brussels, etc., would easily cover a couple of volumes in the series. What is important to you? Save your money. Even after all these years the unit histories are still available from Struv Druk.

Have you ever thought how many years and how much money it would take you to even travel to sources, dig out, collect, collate and publish even 50% of what Prien, et al, have done? Its cheap, folks.

Thanks to Dr. Prien, et al!!!