Play Book Tag discussion

Last summer my sister and I spent a week in Charleston, South Carolina, and had a chance to tour Fort Sumter. As a fan of American history, the Civil War is always one of my favorite topics. How could such a young nation be torn apart by such hatred that brothers, cousins, and friends would take up arms against each other?

While I was aware the first shots of the Civil War happened at Fort Sumter, I 6 didn't know any of the facts or the circumstances that led to the begnning of hostilities. I promised myself to read The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War by Erik Larson as soon as I could.

The six month period before the war was a period of betrayal, error, and miscommunication, Larson focuses on the stories of four individuals: Robert Anderson, Sumter's commander caught between sympathy to the South and loyalty to the Union; Edmund Ruffin, a bloodthirsty radical promoting secession at every turn; Mary Chestnut, the wife of a local planter who is conflicted about marriage and slavery; and the new President, Abraham Lincoln, desperately trying to avert a war.

Larson is always able to illuminate historical events through the lens of real people. His depth of research and his style of writing make every topic deeply compelling. I wasn’t disappointed in this book because of my interest in the subject but many readers will probably find much of the information to be mundane and a bit repetitive.

In his Acknowledgements section, Larson explains that his most valuable resource was The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. It looks fascinating for students of the Civil War and I plan to get a copy in the future.

I was also pretty clueless on Fort Sumter and did gain a lot of information from my read. Although not one of my favorites by Larson, his writing and research were so great, as always, the book still earned 4 stars from me,

I just gave this book to my brother for Xmas. He's a big history buff, particularly the Civil War. So glad to read your positive review.

Olivermagnus wrote: "How could such a young nation be torn apart by such hatred that brothers, cousins, and friends would take up arms against each other?..."

Nice review, OM! The answer to your question, of course, is slavery, which this book makes clear. I also gave it 4 stars. I think the parts set in Fort Sumter were magnificently written, almost as if the reader is present with them.

It also lays to rest that old myth that Abner Doubleday was somehow involved in establishing baseball (he wasn't), which, as a baseball fan, I appreciated.

It wasn't my favorite Larson but I learned a lot about what led up to the Civil War, especially the role Buchanan played in the whole thing. At first I thought the Mary Chestnut part would take away from the war storyline but it actually gave the reader a sense of what was going on in the Southern secessionist social scene.

I hope to get to this one this year!