• ...he occasionally describes Indian peoples in ways that unnecessarily take the perspective of the colonists.

• Reading "The Skulking Way of War" at the beginning of a course on history of technology was a very meaningful experience to me because it makes me to think of a thematic question: what could history of technology offer to the understanding of history in general. The short answer suggested by this book, as I think, is that history of technology provides a distinct angle to study history from the perspective of material culture.

• ...the historical understanding that Malone provided in "The Skulking Way of War" is to construct a vivid, dynamic picture of human activities. It shifts the focus of the materialistic social-economic historiography on "what" the critical historical factors are, and the focus of the narrative historiography on "why" some facts happened, to a how question: how a historical event occurred. A detailed reconstruction of a way of life is itself worth pursuing.

• The simplicity of the vocabulary and text as well as the inclusion of pictures makes the work read like a story. The limpidity of the narrative is refreshing, given especially that he has chosen to include a wealth of dimensions to his work, and notably cultural, anthropological, historical and technological ones.

• While it therefore reads like a bedtime story that one does not easily put down, the question arises as to whether it truly conveys the historical complexity regarding the use of weapons in seventeenth century New England.

• A fine book, but I kept hoping he would say something about the colonial origins of indoor plumbing. This is a very important historical topic, you know.

• While it is very interesting and important to ponder the effects of the war on colonial society, psychology, and subsequent military tactics, it is problematic to take that situation out of its historical context. In brief, I was not always convinced by the cultural (or anthropological or psychological, I'm not sure which one I mean!) elements of his study.

• As a history of a piece of material technology and its social effects, the musket in new England, this is an excellent piece. However, as a piece of social history or a history of cultural contact and adaptation, it is a little too simplistic and its evidentiary base is too limited.

• I enjoyed this book. It provides an interesting insight into a period of time before colonial society had become distinctively American.

• Mmmm, what a great title.

• The take-home thesis for me was that the wars and peace time contact between colonists and indians created an atmosphere of technological borrowing and a fusion of military strategies that resulted in serious changes in the ways both groups went about waging war.

• One thing Malone didn't touch on, that I found fascinating was this idea of "fair" and "honorable" wartime practices, that Malone has traced back to english military mores. ... I wonder if this kind of absurd language is a last vestige of a Western styled objection to the concept of the total war.

• In a larger context, Malone's ultimately very readable book might be an interesting model for any colonialist relationship where technologies - military or otherwise - might be shared or influential between the two parties.

• ...the difference between accounts of the "appropriation" of technology and "technological transfer" is a question of power. This is my main critique of Malone's book: power is very hard to track here and the power differential between European settlers and Native American populations in this instance was vast and, ultimately, deadly for many tribes and their ways of life.

• It was a revelation that the invaders (eventually) learnt from the indigenous people, and it is suggested that this brought the final domination of the Indians. Is this a common assertion? In Australia, it would be rare to ever hear of the British having taken on any of the tactics of the Aboriginal tribes.

• The descriptions of skulking in forests reminded me of images and stories of the jungles of Vietnam and I wondered if Malone's conclusion that Indian tactics influenced all subsequent American wars really was true.

• Think about it, think how alien and adventurous it must have been for both sides, to meet after each had evolved under their own distinct societal ways and dogmas.

• Makes you wonder who was more technically advanced, the powerful European musketeer or the swift Native American archer?

• Malone's book has the feel of a high school textbook (notwithstanding the oversized format of the latest edition): It's informative, but there's something about it that puts you on your guard.

• Although it was a history of technology and tactics among the New England Indians, it indirectly introduced the events that took place during this time. (This is a good way of making Engineers/Scientsits read History).

• What I liked most was the description of the Native Indian way of life.

• The most interesting part in the book is the different morals concerned with warfare among the Indians and the colonists, and how this difference contributed to the colonists' misunderstanding of Indians' potential to conduct wars and their resistance against introducing the Indian way of war (even after its far more efficiency was proven) by the colonists.

• To my eyes, the Indian way of war as well as European way of war is equally new and strange.

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