Veterans of the First World War stems from a symposium held at the University of Edinburgh in March 2017. The resulting edited book contains ten stand-alone essays alongside a co-authored introduction. It seems appropriate to review this multi-authored volume through the remit outlined by its co-editors. In their introduction, Swift and Wilkinson attest that their collection combines political, social, and cultural approaches which update existing scholarship as well as offering new departures and challenges for research related to the study of First World War veterans. Their collection of essays succeeds in this ambition. The book combines a host of informative and innovative case studies for those interested in this burgeoning field of research.

The editors argue convincingly in their introduction that popular and academic research dedicated to disabled veterans of the First World War lags behind comparative analyses into combatant aspects of the conflict. After laying out the need for their collection, Swift and Wilkinson set the foundations for the subsequent chapters by pointing out correctly that there is a trend towards homogenising the veteran experience in existing research. Indeed, the ten following essays attest successfully to the different experiences among veterans and veteran groups which were shaped by a multitude of issues including geography, gender, health, local and domestic informal networks, and political attitudes. Veterans of the First World War holds together despite the wide range in topics explored including, for example, prisoner of war veteran associations, veteran involvement in the Anglo-Irish War, prosthetic limbs, and the impact of the ex-service community on electoral politics. The authors effectively combine to provide research stemming from a disparate array of primary materials, including parliamentary records, veteran association records, the pension and medical files of disabled veterans, and newspapers.

The edited collection also engages usefully with the future study of First World War veterans. For example, Swift and Wilkinson stress the need to analyse veteran ‘dissociation’ and analysis of informal and private spaces in which Great War veterans remained ‘active’ after demobilisation. Wilkinson's final essay reinforces this point by describing the fact that most veterans did not join a veteran association as the ‘elephant in the room’. Jessica Meyer's chapter speaks most clearly to this issue with its focus on everyday space such as local communities and domestic life.

Another salient issue is raised in Martin Purdy's case study of Westfield memorial village for disabled veterans, demonstrating how ex-service communities could respond positively to such paternalistic philanthropic interventions. Purdy argues that such valuable initiatives, and their role in improving the lives of disabled veterans and their families, have often been underappreciated in the historiography. As a researcher involved in the field, I found these contentions most stimulating, and they undoubtedly have the potential to shape future research projects. The editors appear to have made a conscious effort for their collection to influence further research into Great War veterans in the long-term with Wilkinson's concluding entry briefly discussing the potential future direction of cognate research.

For such a comprehensive collection, it would be impossible for the co-editors to deliver a faultless product. By including an introduction and ten chapters in just 190 pages, there were instances where I would have liked to have read more about the topic under discussion, especially when I was reading about issues and organisations for the first time. In this instance, I think it is arguably fairer to judge the edited collection as a primer for research to be published in the future. For example, I look forward to reading more on the veteran organisations discussed in Mike Hally's and Paul Huddie's opening chapters, Krisztina Robert's work on women's veteran organisations and Jessica Meyer's work on the ‘PIN 26’ veteran pension collection. Ultimately, Veterans of the First World War will certainly benefit readers involved in the study of Great War veterans, but also those interested in the First World War as well as the broader field of inter-war Britain and Ireland.