The sword has been a brutally effective weapon for thousands of years, but try to find instruction on using one for self-defense today ad you’re liable to find nothing but books written by dojo-dwelling, gi-wearing martial artists hung up on ancient traditions and picture-perfect stances. For the modern sword aficionado looking for real-world advice, author and pragmatic martial artist Phil Elmore wipes the slate clean with Street Sword: Practical use of the Long Blade for Self-Defense.

Despite attempts by elitists to romanticize, deify, or otherwise elevate it into a mystical artifact, Elmore treats the sword like a tool for delivering force, period. It’s a great big knife. It’s a sharp bat. It’s a really long, really strong pointed stick. These are all the things master swordsmen will tell you the sword is not — and in the context of their very specific dueling arts, they’re right. In the wider and more appropriate context of using the sword to defend yourself, however, there is nothing that makes the sword special. It is a mundane object that obeys the laws of physics, just like any other weapon.

But in an era when shotguns, handguns, expandable batons, and other modern weapons are more portable and concealable, why would you arm yourself with a sword? There are many valid reasons: You might be unwilling or unable to own firearms. You might have a sword in your home as a backup for when you run out of ammo. You might be concerned about overpenetration of projectiles in an urban setting (such as in an apartment complex). You might want an advantage of physical reach. You might just think swords are cool — and we’re lying to ourselves if we don’t admit that, yes, they really are.