Jeff Shaara's writing is clear, and the book contains moments of real insight into the minds of Lee, Jackson, Hancock and Chamberlain.
Shaara manages to provide both the "big picture" (the strategic decisions, political context, and large scale battlefield troop movements) and the lived experience of those directly involved. He is a very good storyteller.
I've learned a great deal about the Battle of Fredericksburg, which serves as the focal point (and climax) of the second half of the book. I did not previously realize how momentous this battle was. It seems like the Union could have ended the war much sooner if Ambrose Burnside had acted decisively (although, in Burnside's defense, the delay of pontoons for crossing the Rappahannock River provided a logistical challenge).
Although Shaara's writing glorifies the soldier's experience, he also captures the futility and tragedy of war. Here's a sampling of his description of Fredericksburg, seen through the eyes General Winfield Scott Hancock:
He rode out along the edge of the formation, watched through his glasses as French's men reached the first of the fences, the lines slowing, men pulling down the wooden rails. The shelling was following them out, like a violent storm that moves with you, the gunners adjusting their range, hurling their solid shot through French's lines with vicious effect. Hancock saw a great black mass hit the ground, splattering dirt and men, and the black ball still coming, rolling and bouncing across the patches of snow and grass, then burrowing into the lines of his own men.A detail that surprised me is that the battle occurred in mid-December, with lots of snow on the ground. When I picture the Civil War, I typically see green fields and summer skies. Something about the idea of men laying in the snow, dead and dying, is gripping.
