Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

The heartbreaking saga of the years preceding The Killer Angels "SHAARA'S BEAUTIFULLY SENSITIVE NOVEL DELVES DEEPLY in the empathetic realm of psycho-history, where enemies do not exist--just mortal men forced to make crucial decisions and survive on the same battlefield. . . . <He> succeeds with his historical novel through fully realized characters who were forced to decide their loyalties amid the... (more)

Battle Cry of Freedom

The Civil War Era

by James M. McPherson

Now featuring a new Afterword by the author, this handy paperback edition of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Battle Cry of Freedom is without question the definitive one-volume history of the Civil War. James McPherson's fast-paced narrative fully integrates the political, social, and military events that crowded the two decades from the outbreak of one war in Mexico to the ending of another at Appomattox. Packed with... (more)

Reconstruction : America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 (New American Nation Series)

Reconstruction : America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877 (New American Nation Series)

by Eric Foner

This "masterful treatment of one of the most complex periods of American history" ( New Republic ) made history when it was originally published in 1988. It redefined how Reconstruction was viewed by historians and people everywhere in its chronicling of how Americans -- black and white -- responded to the unprecedented changes unleashed by the war and the end of slavery. This "smart book of enormous strengths" (... (more)

The Civil War as a Theological Crisis (The Steven and Janice Brose Lectures in the Civil War Era)

The Civil War as a Theological Crisis (The Steven and Janice Brose Lectures in the Civil War Era)

by Mark A. Noll

The Civil War was a major turning point in American religious thought, argues Mark A. Noll. Although Christian believers agreed with one another that the Bible was authoritative and that it should be interpreted through commonsense principles, there was rampant disagreement about what Scripture taught about slavery. Furthermore, most Americans continued to believe that God ruled over the affairs of people and... (more)

The March

by E. L. Doctorow

WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD WINNER OF THE PEN/FAULKNER AWARD NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER “E. L. Doctorow <is> always astonishing. . . . In The March , he dreams himself backward from The Book of Daniel to Ragtime to The Waterworks to the Civil War, into the creation myth of the Republic itself, as if to assume the prophetic role of such nineteenth-century writers as Emerson,... (more)

Life and Campaigns of Stonewall Jackson (Battlefield Evangelism)

Life and Campaigns of Stonewall Jackson (Battlefield Evangelism)

by Robert Lewis Dabney

Stonewall Jackson. His very name evokes the image of the solid, immovable Confederate general whose sobriquet, earned at the Battle of First Manassas, no longer requires quotation marks. In this volume, Stonewall's pious Christian character, service to the church, unwavering commitment to duty, affectionate role as husband and father, as well as his magnificent service to Virginia are carefully recorded by his... (more)

Lincoln's Virtues: An Ethical Biography

by William Lee Miller

William Lee Miller’s ethical biography is a fresh, engaging telling of the story of Lincoln’s rise to power. Through careful scrutiny of Lincoln’s actions, speeches, and writings, and of accounts from those who knew him, Miller gives us insight into the moral development of a great politician — one who made the choice to go into politics, and ultimately realized that vocation’s fullest moral possibilities. As ... (more)

Upon the Altar of the Nation: A Moral History of the Civil War

Upon the Altar of the Nation: A Moral History of the Civil War

by Harry S. Stout

A timely reconsideration of "just war," this landmark history closely examines the moral underpinnings of the War Between the States When the nation tore itself apart during the Civil War, the North and the South marched under the banner of God. Yet the true moral aspects of this war have received little notice from historians of the period. In this gripping volume, Yale religious historian Harry S.... (more)

The Rebel Raiders: The Astonishing History of the Confederacy's Secret Navy (American Civil War)

The Rebel Raiders: The Astonishing History of the Confederacy's Secret Navy (American Civil War)

by James T. De Kay

During its clandestine construction in Liverpool, it was known as “Number 290.” When it was finally unleashed as the CSS Alabama , the Confederate gunship triggered the last great military campaign of the Civil War; a maritime adventure unparalleled in our history; an infamous example of British political treachery; and the largest retribution settlement ever negotiated by an international tribunal: $15,500,000... (more)

Christ in the Camp - Religion in Lee's Army

Christ in the Camp - Religion in Lee's Army

by J. William Jones

In the midst of the titanic struggle of the American War Between the States, a spiritual war for the souls of men was waged with equal vigor. From 1861 to 1865, many thousands of soldiers professed Christ as their Savior and Lord, and many more were renewed in their commitment to serve God in camp and battlefield. Herein are recorded stories of the heroism of chaplains who stood in the line of battle to... (more)

Compact History of the Civil War

by Col. Trevor N. Dupuy, R. Ernest Dupuy

Two of America's most esteemed military historians present a concise, fascinating one-volume encyclopedia of the Civil War which covers all the important aspects of the War from the brilliant campaigns and strategies to the mistakes that cost the South the war. Includes portraits of the great leaders.

Bitter Trail

by Elmer Kelton

In Bitter Trail, Kelton tells the story of a tough teamster named Frio Wheeler whose wagons haul cotton from Texas to Mexico. Sounds like a peaceable enterprise? The problem is that the Civil War is raging throughout the South and Wheeler's cotton is to be sold for gold--gold used to buy guns and ammunition for the Confederate army. And, added to his balky mules, the broiling heat, and killing drought of the... (more)

Tragic Prelude: Bleeding Kansas

by Karen Zeinert

In 1854, the U.S. Congress created Kansas Territory. Whether it would become a slave state, or free, was up to its citizens - so abolitionist Northerners and proslavery Southerners plied their influence on the settlers. Others took the direct route: they rushed into the territory to claim it for their own political side. So began a conflict which would be called "Bleeding Kansas" for the shocking violence... (more)

War So Terrible: Sherman and AtlantaJames Lee McDonough, James Pickett Jones

War So Terrible: Sherman and Atlanta

by James L. McDonough

The fall of Atlanta was a decisive event in the Civil War. As the authors show, it boosted Lincoln's reelection, jolted Confederate morale, and began Sherman's evisceration of the deep South. This is the most extensive review of the sources and the first modern interpretation of this dramatic campaign. The authors limn portraits of many soldiers, with a very favorable rendering of Sherman as strategist; offer... (more)

Florida In The Civil War

by Sandra Friend

Grade 8&Up--Friend utilizes quotes from many people of the day in this view of the Civil War. Florida was the third state to join the Confederacy and contributed food stuffs and beef to the army and to the civilian population. The state's miles of coastline offered harbors for blockade-runners and its rivers provided vital communication links. Its citizens valiantly defended their state against Union soldiers;... (more)

Patchwork Angel

by Laurel Collins

When the War Between the States erupts, free-spirited backwoods healer Maggie Wade is horrified at the conditions present in the field hospital. Anxious to help the fallen soldiers, she meets Dr. Bryce Cameron, a disciplined and rigid army surgeon--and disrupts both his hospital and his life. Now, caught in their own passionate, private war, Maggie and Bryce must surrender to love. .

Two little confederates

by Thomas Nelson Page

This look at the Civil War through the eyes of two young Southern brothers exposes the many evils done to the South by the North.

A Defense of Virginia and the South

356 pages. First published in 1867. Yankee propagandists have long insisted that the true cause of the War of 1861 was the immoral system of Southern slavery. To the contrary, Robert Lewis Dabney shows from Scripture that slavery, as practiced in the South, was not inherently wicked, as claimed by the Northern Abolitionists, but was and remains sanctioned by Gods Word, and that, while the wealth of New England was... (more)

Living History: The Civil War the History of the War Between the States in Documents, Essays, Letters, Songs, Poems

Living History: The Civil War the History of the War Between the States in Documents, Essays, Letters, Songs, Poems

by Henry Steele (ed) Commager

Gone with the Wind

by Margaret Mitchell

Margaret Mitchell's epic novel of love and war won the Pulitzer Prize and went on to give rise to two authorized sequels and one of the most popular and celebrated movies of all time. Many novels have been written about the Civil War and its aftermath. None take us into the burning fields and cities of the American South as Gone With the Wind does, creating haunting scenes and thrilling portraits of characters... (more)

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by Jeff Shaara