True History — Illustrated — Reads Like a Thriller

Real military history for boys 9–14, with an illustration on every page.

Mongol horse archers at a gallop, one twisting in the saddle to shoot behind him — How the Mongols beat bigger armies — in four pictures

Diagram: a large enemy force chasing a smaller line of Mongol riders across open ground — How the Mongols beat bigger armies — in four pictures

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An illustration on every page · Real history, sourced · Ages 9–14 · 3 free audio chapters

Book 3 Genghis Khan — The Boy Left to Die. Out in days. Tell me when it lands

Look Inside

An Illustration on Every Page

Real pages from Books 1 and 3 · tap any page to enlarge

Genghis Khan page 195: a full-page data spread with a map of the Mongol Empire in 1218, a table of five wars and how each stands, and a bar showing 12 million people under Mongol rule

Genghis Khan page 196: chapter opening, The Insult That Started a War, with a labelled character plate introducing Jebe, Mongol General

Genghis Khan page 197: a labelled character plate of Shah Muhammad II of Khwarezm reviewing his cavalry, above the merchant caravan setting out

Genghis Khan page 201: a plate labelled Genghis Khan, Age 56 — the khan alone on a hilltop with his army waiting on the plain below

Genghis Khan page 203: the Mongol army fording the Syr Darya river into Khwarezm with its spare horses

Genghis Khan page 205: a full-page plate of one rider leading his string of five horses, captioned with why every Mongol rode with spares

Genghis Khan page 207: Mongol horse archers at the gallop, and the page explaining the shot fired backwards over the saddle

Genghis Khan page 209: two wordless tactical diagrams — the pursuing army encircled, and the trap sprung at the Kalka River

Genghis Khan page 211: a full-page plate of the Mongol column winding out across the Kyzyl Kum desert

Genghis Khan page 214: Genghis Khan riding at the head of his army toward Bukhara

Full-page illustration: Hannibal mounted before his army at Cannae

Chapter opening, Cannae: Hannibal on the ridge at dawn watching the Roman column

Hannibal and his officers around the campfire the night before Cannae

Hannibal riding along his line at dawn, speaking to his men

The clash at the Carthaginian center at Cannae

Numidian cavalry, and the Cannae encirclement diagram

The Carthaginian Senate debating whether to reinforce Hannibal

Hannibal's veterans returning home by ship after sixteen years

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What’s Inside

THREE WAYS THE HISTORY IS TOLD

The pictures are not decoration. They carry the history.

Full-page pen-and-ink plate: the Mongol column winding away across the Kyzyl Kum desert

Scene Art

Pen-and-ink, framed like a film. One line of the history sits underneath each picture — the image and the sentence do the work together.

Labelled character plate: Jebe, Mongol General, riding into a captured city

Character Plates

Everyone who matters is introduced by name, like a card in a deck. Jebe. Mongol General. Shah Muhammad II of Khwarezm. Genghis Khan — Age: 56.

Full-page data spread: map of the Mongol Empire in 1218, a table of five wars, and a bar showing 12 million people under Mongol rule

Maps, Tables & Diagrams

Empire maps, war tables, population bars — and tactics laid out in pictures with no words at all. A nine-year-old can read a cavalry manoeuvre off the page.

9Years Old When He Swore the Oath

37War Elephants Over the Alps

50,000Men He Led Into Italy

15Years Fighting on Roman Soil

1Day at Cannae Rome Never Forgot

Hannibal

Military Stories for Boys · Book 1 · Available Now

HANNIBAL

The General Who Almost Destroyed Rome

Not a textbook. It opens on a freezing Alpine pass with an army coming apart at the seams — then goes back to the boy who swore, at nine, that he would never be a friend to Rome. From that promise to the afternoon he nearly destroyed the greatest power on earth.

Real strategy. Real terrain. Real consequences. Written for boys aged 9–14 who are ready for history that doesn't talk down to them.

An illustration on every page — usually one or two, up to three in the thick of a battle
Opens inside the action — hooked before the end of page one
The full story, from the boyhood oath to the war that shook Rome
Original tactical diagrams — see Cannae from above and understand the genius
Honest about war. No sanitising. No invented happy endings.

★★★★★ 4.6 on Amazon · 19 ratings Paperback $19.99 · Ebook $12.99

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From the Prologue — Hannibal: The General Who Almost Destroyed Rome

The path smelled of animal dung and the rank odor of men who had not been dry in two weeks. The sky above the cliffs was the flat gray of early morning, no sun yet, just the slow cold brightening that passes for dawn at nine thousand feet.

Their boots were coming apart. The cold had been inside his armor since before dawn.

He was twenty-nine years old. He had been planning this for two years.

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Where It Comes From

IT TELLS HIM WHAT WE KNOW — AND WHAT WE DON’T

These are non-fiction. Real people, real dates, real events, taken from primary and near-primary sources — and the sources are named on the page, mid-story, in words he reads without stopping.

“Juvayni, a Persian historian, reports…”
“The Secret History records what he did, not what he thought about it.”

And where the record runs out, the book says so rather than filling the gap.

“Nobody drew exact borders in these years.”
“Nobody counted these armies. The bars show the best guess.”
“Their exact number is disputed today.”

Honest about war, too. No sanitising, no gore, no invented happy endings.

What Readers Say

DON’T TAKE MY WORD FOR IT

4.8Alexander
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4.6Hannibal
19 ratings

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The Series

Real history, written like a thriller — for boys 9–14. More titles on the way.

Hannibal

Book 1HannibalAvailable

Alexander the Great

Book 2AlexanderAvailable

Genghis Khan

Book 3Genghis KhanOut in Days

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Why This Series Exists

THE CASE FOR READING

The research on screens and reading is not ambiguous, and neither is the fix. Real war, honestly told, with no gore — and a story he can’t put down doing the quiet work underneath.

9,500+children tracked in the ABCD Study — more screen time, more anxiety and impulsivity

75%of parents report more imagination in children who read regularly

68%report better concentration once a reading habit takes hold

2024peer-reviewed: reading causally increases brain volume in adolescents

Read the Research → How We Handle the Violence →

Sources: Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study (ABCD, 9,500+ children); Cambridge University; Wiley Advanced Science 2024; MS Ireland / Cambridge Survey 2023

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WHAT THESE BOOKS ARE

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