"A Southern Yarn" by R. W. Richards

Essay by ultima9High School, 10th gradeA, January 1997

download word file, 3 pages 3.9

Downloaded 29 times

Book Review

The book I read was titled A Southern Yarn. It is an interesting story about what might have happened if General Lee had won a minor battle in the Civil War. The author, R. W. Richards, tries to convince you that the South might have possibly won, if Lee had won a small fight in the Battle of Spotsylvainia. Richards does a successful job, and makes the story believable, if a little far fetched. The idea that the South can win so many battles, outgunned, outnumbered, and undersupplied, was, I thought, a little unbelievable. The story also captured the spirit of war - it starts out, and everybody's aching to fight, and then the reality hits, and you just want it to end. Richards was able to describe the horrors without making them over gory and over done.

The characters were realistic, due to the fact that they had a lot of human traits.

Unlike a lot of heroes, they experience pain and fear. They were really passionate about their beliefs, and I thought that was realistic. They were fighting because they belied someone was trying to take their right away. You feel sorry when one of the group dies and wonder what you might do in such a situation. General Lee is described as an honorable, intelligent man that was a hero. In the Battle of Spotsyvainia, he charges with the army, even though the other men are trying to get him to go back to the rear so he won't get killed. Grant, however, is described as a grumpy man who cares nothing for anything but to win the war. He blames everything that goes wrong on his generals, and takes the glory for doing something right. Several other minor characters are mentioned in this...