Good books?

[D.Ram]

I generally googled phrases like "Best Karate books" or "Best Martial Arts books", and in most cases, I either get (a) very useless lists, or (b) Lists of very obscure/unavailable books, or (C) a link to Nakayama Sensei's "Best Karate" series

Do you have any recommendations of the type "Even if you read just one book, read this one!"?
I have gone through these -
a) General Karate - Nakayama Sensei's Dynamic Karate - great, but I keep wondering if I should have bought Nishiyama Sensei's book instead? (The art of empty hand fighting)
Have also gone through Bruce Lee's books, but they're really too generic!

b) Katas - Kanazawa Sensei's book, since this is most relevant to my training!

c) Kumite - none yet, but hoping to lay my hands on Kanazawa Sensei's book on the topic

Have recently read about "Dead or Alive" on this forum, and have found previews on Amazon to be amazing - will buy this soon!

[Deleted]

I was going to say Dead or Alive, but pleased to hear it is already on your list :-)

Along Similar sort of lines have you tried Bunkai Jutsu the Practical Application of Karate by Ian Abernenthy?

I haven't read that one myself, but I have his Applied Karate DVD's, and have his Throws for Strikes and Armlocks for all Styles books. His stuff is very practical/real world a lot like Geoff Thompson's Dead or Alive.

[th0mas]

Ih would agree with everything Paul suggested and you might also want to have a read of Bill Burger's Five Years, One Kata - he proposes an interesting approach Kata Bunkai interpretation...

...for really good free reading material why not try out Iain's Article section on his web site iainabernethy.co.uk/articles.

[D.Ram]

Thanks a ton, Tom, Paul!
The link is great, and will go through each article! I tried the book suggested by Paul but even the Kindle version is about 30 USD - way over my budget
I have only seen a few brief videos by Iain on Youtube, but your messages will now push me to watch and read more!

P.S - Just bought the Kindle version of Dead or Alive!

[nathanso]

If you are looking for freebies, here are a few that you can download. I've included the links for most of them. Some of these will show you how there are just a limited number of things to do with your body, irrespective of supposed style or even "art":

Jack Dempsey's Championship Boxing- lots of great things about how to move and hit.

Jiu-Jitsu and Other Methods of Self Defense by Percy Longhurst.

Kill or Get Killed, by Applegate

Rob Redmond's Kata book

A Wado book on their kumite katas

Comprehensive Karate by Michael Rosenbaum

[Deleted]

Jun 7, 2013 5:47:45 GMT D.Ram said:

Thanks a ton, Tom, Paul!
The link is great, and will go through each article! I tried the book suggested by Paul but even the Kindle version is about 30 USD - way over my budget

I know what you mean, stuff like this usually goes on my Xmas list so other people pay :-)

Let us know how you get on with Dead or Alive.