Good ideas in if you shoot someone legally. Different types of weapons. Checking your local laws on weapons. You can get in serious trouble protecting yourself or family even inside your house. Author makes you think maybe a gun might not be the best or first choice of weapons.

Very basic but that is to be expected. If your looking for a collection in one spot for newbies, this book is for you.

Pretty decent book, some very useful information, and some stuff is just okay. Worth the purchase

Tons of useful information for many situations. Would recommend for anyone interested in being ready for any and everything.

If you’ve decided that you need to be able to better protect yourself or the ones you love should the need arise, but you’re not sure how to proceed, Prepper’s Armed Defense by Jim Cobb is the place to begin. Not sure if you want a pistol or a rifle or a shotgun? Perhaps a compound bow would be preferable? Would mace or a TASER be sufficient? What are the advantages and disadvantages of a knife? How about a crossbow? After all, Daryl Dixon seems to have done well with one in The Walking Dead.

More than once while browsing at a chain store or a local gun shop, I’ve listened while a sales person tells someone why s/he should have a particular firearm. Often, the customers look dazed or confused. I once watched a seller try to convince a woman who could not have weighed more than 100 pounds why her first-ever pistol should be a .44 magnum “Dirty Harry” special. The point isn’t whether or not she could learn to effectively fire such a weapon. The question should have been: What’s the best choice for this person?

Jim Cobb’s Prepper’s Armed Defense approaches the topic of self-defense as if the reader knows little or nothing about the topics that he explains so well and in such detail. Each topic, from non-lethal means of defense, to knives and guns and projectile weapons, to melee weapons, martial arts, and a most enlightening chapter on force multipliers, is clearly written to help the reader understand the fundamentals of each topic.

Unlike so many salespeople, Mr. Cobb does not pretend to know what kind of weapon a person should have. He has written a thorough, clear, and comprehensive introduction to help the reader (prepper or not) begin to consider and answer these questions for him-herself. He has certain preferences and doesn’t hesitate to let the reader know. For example, there’s a big difference between using a knife or a gun for self-defense. If you decide to use a knife, you’ll be getting up close and personal with your attacker in a much different way than using a firearm requires.

I wish this book had been available when I was younger and began taking interest in target shooting. Although I grew up around guns and hunting and shooting, making decisions about what kind of firearms I wanted was often daunting, because so many take it for granted that basic terms and information are givens. Prepper’s Armed Defense is a huge improvement over books that assume the reader has a basic comprehension necessary to understand guns, knives, projectile weapons, etc.

If you’re in Special Ops or law enforcement, you’ll find this a pretty basic read. That’s the point of Prepper’s Armed Defense: to provide readers with basic inform about about weapons and self-defense. The book not only informs but make it possible to ask further questions about the topics under discussion. For the rest of us, it’s a treasure trove of essential understanding.

Of all the books I’ve read on these topics, none does a better job of presenting information in a context that promotes understanding. The inclusion of information on Molotov cocktails, brass knuckles, clubs and batons, alarms, remote surveillance, and more, provides information for consideration of other options.

I wish the author had provided a more extensive list of online links to supplement information. Mr. Cobb’s survivalweekly.com is mentioned, and a number of useful online sources are provided, but additional links to specific, go-to topics would be helpful. There’s an overwhelming number of websites on this topic, and had Mr. Cobb added a few links to each chapter topic, it would have served as a pathfinder for the reader to build on the information presented in the book.

I received a complimentary copy of this book for a fair and objective review.