John Moses Browning is, without argument, the greatest firearms designer in history. While we have had many brilliant designers who had their names forever connected to guns (Maxim, Luger, Kalashnikov...), Browning invented whole categories of firearms. Gorenstein's new book "The Guns of John Moses Browning" is a welcome biography of the man, giving great insight into Browning's life and work. The book is well researched, well written, and thoroughly engaging. It is also worth noting that Gorenstein is himself a competitive shooter, and understands the world that Browning operated in.

I think my back-cover blurb for the book (for which I received no compensation; full disclosure) sums it up well:

Following Browning from his birth in rural Utah to his death in urban Belgium, we see how a changing world shaped his inventions and how, in turn, his inventions shaped a changing world.

Browning began in the last years of the Wild West inventing lever action rifles, then became a major part of the blossoming of the automatic pistol, then invented the semiauto shotgun before designing the modern machine guns that become iconic to the United States' involvement in two world wars. It is a tremendous story, and Gorenstein's book lays it all out for the reader.