Book review by Jack Smith
If you are a fan of historical novels, you could do worse than reading Jeff Shaara. Jeff is the New York Times best-selling author who finished his father Michael Shaara’s Pulitzer-winning trilogy on the Civil War. His father’s novel, “Killer Angel,” was completed with Jeff’s “Gods and Generals“ and “The Last Full Measure.” Only filmmaker Ken Burns and historian Shelby Foote provide the same insight into the men who actually fought. Shaara depicted the emotional drama of soldiers fighting old friends while actually describing the battles and their outcomes. “Gods and Generals” covers the events leading up to the war, including General Lee’s disillusionment with the Confederate bureaucracy. In 2003, “Gods and Generals” was made into a film starring Robert Duvall and Jeff Daniels. Jeff Shaara has produced fifteen New York Times bestsellers and over thirty novels dealing with The Revolutionary War, World War I, World War II, and Korea. His newest book deals with the Battle of Midway.
