Reviews

Review Policy:

I, from time to time, receive complimentary copies of books, DVD's, CD's or software for review from authors, publishers, musicians, artists or their distributors. Though it happens infrequently, I thought it might be a good time to post my policy regarding reviews.

Any complimentary review copy of a book I receive will be immediately placed on top of my reading pile and given the highest priority. If you are going to be generous enough to send me a book, then I, of course, will be gracious enough to read and review it as soon as I am able. However, that being said, if I’m currently in the middle of a book I’m not going to drop everything and immediately read yours, but you can be assured yours will be the very next book I will read. If a backlog should occur, I will read the books in the order in which I received them.

Once I receive an item for review I will post preliminary information about the item on the blog and on this page under the heading "In The Review Queue". Once I post my review of the item I will send you an email with links to the specific review so that you may read what I have written.  I will also delete the previous "In The Review Queue" post.  In essence, there will be two posts about any item that I review, but only the actual review will remain permanently on the blog.

I will post each review here, on this blog, and also on Amazon.com, as well as any other website you would like. Please keep in mind that just because you are sending me a something to review, does not guarantee you will receive a good review. I can, however, promise you a fair and honest review.

I will post book reviews typically within 1 to 6 months of receiving the book (depending on how busy I am). I will post DVD, CD & software reviews within 1 to 4 weeks of receiving the item.

If you have a book, DVD, CD or software you would like me to review you may email me HERE.

In The Review Queue:

• The Enemy Never Came: The Civil War in the Pacific North West by Scott McArthur
• Standing Firmly By the Flag by James E. Potter
• Louisiana Scalawags by Frank J. Wetta
• The Prairie Boys Go To War by Rhonda M. Kohl
• Allegany to Appomattox: The Life and Letters of Private William Whitlock of the 188th New York Volunteers by Valgene Dunham
• The Politics of Faith During the Civil War by Timothy L. Wesley
• Stonewall Goes West: A Novel of the Civil War and What Might Have Been by R. E. Thomas
• Gettysburg: The True Account of Two Young Heroes in the Greatest Battle of the Civil War by Iain C. Martin
• A World On Fire: Britain's Crucial Role in the American Civil War by Amanda Foreman
• The Last Battle of Winchester: Phil Sheridan, Jubal Early, and the Shenandoah Valley Campaign, August 7 - September 19, 1864 by Scott Patchan
• The Enigmatic South: Toward Civil War and Its Legacies, Edited by Samuel C. Hyde, Jr
• Lincoln's Assassination, Edward Steers Jr.
• Lincoln and the War's End, John C. Waugh
• Lincoln and the Military, John F. Marszalek
• Busy in the Cause: Iowa, the Free-State Struggle in the West, and the Prelude to the Civil War, Lowell J. Soike
• Spring 1865: The Closing Campaigns of the Civil War, Perry D. Jamieson
• Engineering Victory: The Union Siege of Vicksburg, Justin S. Solonick
• Across the Bloody Chasm: The Culture of Commemoration among Civil War Veterans, M. Keith Harris
• Politics and Power in a Slave Society: Alabama 1800-1860, J. Mills Thornton
• Appomattox: The Last Days of Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, Michael Haskew
• The Civilian War: Confederate Women and Union Soldiers during Sherman's March, Lisa Tendrich Frank
• The Best Writings of Ulysses S. Grant, Edited by John F. Marszalek
• 1865: America Makes War and Peace in Lincoln’s Final Year, Edited by Harold Holzer and Sara Vaughn Gabbard
• Confederate Cavalryman Versus Union Cavalryman: Eastern Theater 1861-65, Ron Field, Illustrated by Peter Dennis
• Lincoln's Greatest Case: The River, the Bridge, and the Making of America, Brian McGinty
• The Battle of Petersburg, June 15-18, 1864, Sean Michael Chick
• Abolitionizing Missouri: German Immigrants and Racial Ideology in Nineteenth-Century America, Kristen Layne Anderson
• The Peace That Almost Was: The Forgotten Story of the 1861 Washington Peace Conference and the Final Attempt to Avert the Civil War, Mark Tooley
• A Self-Made Man: The Political Life of Abraham Lincoln Vol. I, 1809 – 1849, Sidney Blumenthal
• The Tennessee Campaign of 1864, Edited by Steven E. Woodworth and Charles D. Grear,
• Confederate Political Economy: Creating and Managing a Southern Corporatist Nation, 1861-1865, Michael Brem Bonner
• From Slave to Statesman, The Live of Educator, Editor and Civil Rights Activist Willis M. Carter of Virginia, Robert Heinrich & Deborah Harding
• Extreme Civil War: Guerilla Warfare, Environment, and Race on the Trans-Mississippi Frontier, Matthew M. Stith
• A Civil War Captain and his Lady: Love, Courtship and Combat from Fort Donelson through the Vicksburg Campaign, Gene Barr
• Women in Civil War Texas: Diversity and Dependence in the Trans-Mississippi, Edited by Deborah M. Liles & Angela Boswell
• Pickett's Charge: A New Look at Gettysburg's Final Attack, Philip Thomas Tucker
• The Quatermaster: Montgomery C. Meigs, Lincoln's General , Master Builder of the Union Army, Robert O'Harrow, Jr.
• Wolford's Cavalry: The Colonel, the War in the West, and the Emancipation Question in Kentucky, Dan Lee
• The Damned of Petersburg, Ralph Peters
• Wrestling with his Angel: The Political Life of Abraham Lincoln, Volume II 1849-1856, Sidney Blumenthal
• Lincoln in Indiana by Brian Dirck
• The Sharpshooters: A History of the Ninth New Jersey Volunteer Infantry in the Civil War, Edward G. Longacre
• The Republic for Which It Stands: The United States during Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, 1865-1896, by Richard White
• A Day in September: The Battle of Antietam and the World It Left Behind, By Stephen Budiansky

Posted Reviews:

Nonfiction

• 1863: Lincoln's Pivotal Year edited by Harold Holzer and Sara Vaughn Gabbard
• Abraham and Mary Lincoln by Kenneth J. Winkle
• Abraham Lincoln and Horace Greeley by Gregory A. Borchard
• Abraham Lincoln and the Election of 1860 by Michael S. Green
• Abraham Lincoln Civil War Stories: Heartwarming Stories about Our Most Beloved President, Edited by Joe Wheeler
• All the Great Prizes: The Life of John Hay, from Lincoln to Roosevelt by John Taliaferro
• Amiable Scoundrel: Simon Cameron, Lincoln's Scandalous Secretary of War, by Paul Kahan
• America's Great Debate: Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and the Compromise That Preserved the Union, by Fergus M. Bordewich
• The American President: A Complete History by Kathryn Moore
• American Soldier: The Life and Times of William Tecumseh Sherman, by John S. D. Eisenhower
• American Uprising: The Untold Story of America’s Largest Slave Revolt by Daniel Rasmussen
• Armchair Reader Civil War: Untold Tales of the Blue and Gray
• Army of the Potomac: Birth of Command November 1860 – September 1862 by Russel Beatie
• Army of the Potomac, Volume II: McClellan Takes Command, September 1861-February 1862 by Russel H. Beatie
• The Artillery of Gettysburg by Bradley M. Gottfried, Ph. D
• The Battle of Stones River by Larry J. Daniel
• Bloody Crimes: The Chase for Jefferson Davis and the Death Pageant for Lincoln's Corpse by James L. Swanson
• The Bonfire: The Siege and Burning of Atlanta by Marc Wortman
• Causes Won, Lost & Forgotten: How Hollywood and Popular Art Shape What We Know About the Civil War by Gary W. Gallagher
• The Chattanooga Campaign, Edited by Steven E. Woodworth & Charles D. Grear
• The Civil War, 1861-1865: Smithsonian Headliners Series By Eric C. Caren & Stephen A. Goldman
• The Civil War: A Visual History by Parragon Books
• The Civil War Generals: Comrades Peers, Rivals - In Their Own Words by Robert I. Girardi
• The Civil War in Color:A Photographic Reenactment of the War Between the States by John C Guntzelman
• The Civil War: The First Year Told By Those Who Lived It edited by Brooks D. Simpson, Stephen W. Sears and Aaron Sheehan-Dean
• The Civil War: The Second Year Told By Those Who Lived It, edited by Stephen Sears
• The Civil War: The Third Year Told By Those Who Lived It, edited by Brooks D. Simpson
• Co. "Aytch": The First Tennessee Regiment or a Side Show to the Big Show,The Complete Illustrated Edition, by Sam Watkins
• Columbus Georgia 1865: The Last True Battle of the Civil War By Charles A. Misulia
• The Confederate Alamo: Bloodbath at Petersburg's Fort Gregg on April 2, 1865 by John J. Fox, III
• Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South by Stephanie McCurry
• Did Lincoln Own Slaves? And Other Frequently Asked Questions About Abraham Lincoln by Gerald J. Prokopowicz
• A Disease in the Public Mind: A New Understanding of Why We Fought The Civil War by Thomas Fleming
• Embattled Rebel: Jefferson Davis as Commander in Chief, James B. McPherson
• The Encyclopedia of Civil War Medicine, by Glenna R. Schroeder-Lein
• The Fall of the House of Dixie by Bruce Levine
• The Fiddler on Pantico Run: An African Warrior, His White Descendants, A Search For Family by Joe Mozingo
• Fields of Glory: A History and Tour Guide of the War in the West, the Atlanta Campaign, 1864, Second Edition by Jim Miles
• For Cause &for Country: A Study of the Affair At Spring Hill & the Battle of Franklin by Eric A. Jacobson
• For Liberty: My Ancestor’s Story of Immigration and the Civil War, by Larry B. Bramble
• General Grant and the Rewriting of History: How the Destruction of General William S. Rosecrans Influenced Our Understanding of the Civil War by Frank P. Varney
• The Generals of Shiloh: Character in Leadership, April 6-7, 1862, by Larry Tagg,
• Gettysburg, The Turning Point of the War: 150th Anniversary Tribute Edited by Kelly Knauer
• Giant in the Shadows: The Life of Robert T. Lincoln by Jason Emerson
• A Glorious Army: Robert E. Lee's Triumph 1862-1863 by Jeffry D. Wert
• The Good Men Who Won The War: Army Of The Cumberland Veterans And Emancipation Memory By Robert Hunt
• The Grand Design: Strategy and the U. S. Civil War by Donald Stoker
• Grant at Vicksburg: The General and the Siege by Michael B. Ballard
• Grant's Final Victory: Ulysses S. Grant's Final Year by Charles Bracelen Flood
• Grant's Lieutenants: From Cairo to Vicksburg, Edited by Steven E. Woodworth
• Grant's Lieutenants: From Chattanooga to Appomattox, Edited by Steven E. Woodworth
• Great Civil War Heroes And Their Battles: Sesquicentennial Edition By Walton Rawls
• Guns Of The Civil War by Dennis Adler
• Hallowed Ground: A Walk at Gettysburg:The Illustrated Edition, by James M. McPherson
• Here Is Where: Discovering America's Great Forgotten History by Andrew Carroll
• House of Abraham: Lincoln & The Todds, A Family Divided By War by Stephen Berry
• An Illustrated Guide To Virginia's Civil War Monuments by Timothy S. Sedore
• John Bell Hood and the Fight for Civil War Memory by Brian Craig Miller
• Killing Lincoln by Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard
• The Last Confederate General: John C. Vaughn and his East Tennessee Cavalry by Larry Gordon
• Lincoln and His Admirals by Craig L. Symonds
• Lincoln and McClellan at War by Chester G. Hearn
• Lincoln and the Civil War by Michael Burlingame
• Lincoln and the Sioux Uprising of 1862 by Hank H. Cox
• Lincoln On War by Harold Holzer
• Lincoln: Biography of a Writer by Fred Kaplan
• Lincoln's Code: The Laws of War in American History by John Fabian Witt
• The Long Road to Antietam by Richard Slotkin
• The Maps of Chickamauga by David A. Powell & David A. Friedrichs
• The Maps of Gettysburg: An Atlas Of The Gettysburg Campaign, June 3 - July 13, 1863 by Bradley Gottfried
• The Medal of Honor: A History of Service Above and Beyond, The Editors of Boston Publishing Company
• Mending Broken Soldiers by Guy R. Hasegawa
• Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid that Sparked the Civil War by Tony Horwitz
• Never Caught: The Washingtons' Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave Ona Judge by Erica Armstrong Dunbar
• The New Gettysburg Campaign Handbook:  Facts, Photos, and Artwork for Readers of All Ages, June 9 - July 14, 1863 by J. David Petruzzi & Steven Stanley
• Now the Drum of War: Walt Whitman and his Brothers in the Civil War by Robert Roper
• One Continuous Fight: The Retreat from Gettysburg and the Pursuit of Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia July 4-14, 1863 By Eric J. Wittenberg, J. David Petruzzi and Michael F. Nugent
• Plenty Of Blame To Go Around by Eric J. Wittenberg and J. David Petruzzi
• Preserve It Reader In Remembrance Of Me: The Writings and Saga of American Civil War Soldier George W. Belles by Ron Bardnell
• The Rebel and the Rose: James A. Semple, Julia Gardiner Tyler and the Lost Confederate Gold by Wesley Millett & Gerald White
• Rise to Greatness, Abraham Lincoln and America's Most Perilous Year, by David Von Drehle 
• Robert Toombs: The Civil Wars of a United States Senator and Confederate General by Mark Scroggins
• Shenandoah 1862 by Peter Cozzens
• Shiloh 1862 by Winston Groom
• Shiloh and the Western Campaign of 1862 by O. Edward Cunningham
• Sickles at Gettysburg by James A. Hessler
• The Siege of Washington: The Untold Story of the Twelve Days that Shook The Union by John Lockwood & Charles Lockwood
• Shooting Soldiers: Civil War Medical Photography by R. B. Bontecou by Stanley B. Burnes, M.D.
• Smithsonian Civil War: Inside the National Collection, edited by Neil Kagan
• Star Spangled Scandal by Chris DeRose
• Stoneman's Raid 1865 by Chris J. Hartley
• The Stonewall Brigade in the Civil War by Patrick Hook & Steve Smith
• Storming the Heights: A Guide to the Battle of Chattanooga by Matt Spruill, Maps by Lowell Forbes
• Such Troops as These: The Genius and Leadership of Confederate General Stonewall Jackson, by Bevin Alexander
• Tried By War: Abraham Lincoln As Commander In Chief by James M. McPherson
• Triumph & Defeat: The Vicksburg Campaign by Terrence J. Winschel
• Triumph & Defeat: The Vicksburg Campaign, Vol. 2 by Terrence J. Winschel
• Undaunted Heart: The True Story of a Southern Belle & a Yankee General by Suzy Barile
• Union Heartland: The Midwestern Home Front During the Civil War, Edited by Ginette Aley & J. L. Anderson
• United States Army: The Definitive Illustrated History, by D. M. Giangreco
• The Unpopular Mr. Lincoln: The Story of America's Most Reviled President by Larry Tagg
• Vanishing Footprints: The Twenty-Second Iowa Volunteer Infantry in the Civil War by Samuel D. Pryce. Edited by Jeffry C. Burden
• The Vicksburg Assaults, May 19-22, 1863, Edited by Steven E. Woodworth & Charles D. Grear
• The Vicksburg Campaign, March 29—May 18,1863, Edited by Steven E. Woodworth and Charles D. Grear
• War Like The Thunderbolt: The Battle and Burning of Atlanta by Russell S. Bonds
• War on the Waters: The Union & Confederate Navies, 1861-1865 by James M. McPherson
• The West Point History of the Civil War, edited by Clifford J. Rogers, Ty Siedule, & Samuel J. Watson
• Winter Lightning: A Guide to the Battle of Stones River by Matt Spruill & Lee Spruill
• Wisdom From the Oval Office: Words from George Washington to the Present, by Pierce Word

Fiction:

• The Battle of the Crater by Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen
• Beaufort 1849 by Karen Lynn Allen
• A Beckoning Hellfire: A Novel of the Civil War by J. D. R. Hawkins
• Bedlam South: A Novel by Mark Grisham & David Donaldson
• A Blaze of Glory: A Novel of the Battle of Shiloh by Jeff Shaara
• Cain At Gettysburg by Ralph Peters
• The Civil War Battle Series by James Reasoner
• Book 1: Manassas
• Book 2: Shiloh
• Devil's Dream: A Novel by Madison Smartt Bell
• The Disagreement: A Novel by Nick Taylor
• Enemy Women by Paulette Giles
• The First Assassin by John J. Miller
• Hell or Richmond by Ralph Peters
• Hiram's Honor: Reliving Private Terman's Civil War, by Max R. Terman
• Knoxville 1863 by Dick Stanley
• The Mule Shoe by Perry Trouche
• Northern Roses and Southern Belles By Various Authors of the Wild Rose Press
• Of Blood and Brothers: Book One, by E. Michael Helms
• Of Blood and Brothers: Book Two, by E. Michael Helms
• The Ones They Left Behind, by Antonio Emaleh
• Pittsburg Landing by Robert Burns Clark
• The Reckoning, by Bob Larranaga
• Savannah, or a Gift for Mr. Lincoln by John Jakes
• Shades of Gray: A Novel of the Civil War in Virginia by Jessica James
• Shiloh by Shelby Foote
• Two Brothers: One North, One South by David H. Jones
• The Wedding Gift by Marlen Suyapa Bodden

Children's Books:

• Civil War Adventure #2: Real History: More Stories of the War That Divided America by Chuck Dixon and Gary Kwapisz
• Old Abe, Eagle Hero: The Civil War's Most Famous Mascot text by Patrick Young & illustrations by Anne Lee
• Gettysburg: The Graphic History of America's Most Famous Battle and the Turning Point of the Civil War by Wayne Vansant
• Grant vs. Lee: The Graphic History of the Civil War's Greatest Rivals During the Last Year of the War by Wayne Vansant

Movies and DVD's:

• American Experience: The Abolitionists
• American Experience: Custer's Last Stand
• American Experience: Death and the Civil War
• American Experience: Robert E. Lee
• The Battle of Stones River: The Fight For Murfreesboro
• Civil War 360
• The Conspirator
• Copperhead
• Gods and Generals