The Cotillion Brigade: A Novel of the Civil War and the Most Famous Female Militia in American History

This book is a fascinating mixture of the lives of real people and their experiences before and during the Civil War, mingled with conversations and happenings that the author included to make the novel's plot both entertaining and realistic. I particularly like the way in which he wove together the stories of Hugh LaGrange and Nancy Morgan in alternating chapters, bringing the two people together at the end. I know nothing about military strategy, but even these facts were presented in such a way as to make for interesting reading. He covered a part of American history that is not often, if ever, discussed.

Love this book

it was for my wife

Fabulous historical drama that reads like GWTW with real characters. Craney takes the time to not only set the ideology of both sides of the Mason-Dixon line, he gets into the protagonists so deeply you feel and think as they do. He then crosses the chasm of disagreement and hatred to remind us all that we are all Americans and what that really means, especially in these adversarial times. His portrayal of the women of the times is stellar and what's long been missing from the journals of the Civil War. A must read in the style and genre of the Shaara's.

I am in the process of reading the book now. I am enjoying it.