In the first novel of a spellbinding new trilogy, New York Times
bestselling author Jeff Shaara returns to the Civil War terrain he knows
best. A Blaze of Glory takes us to the action-packed Western Theater
for a vivid re-creation of one of the war's bloodiest and most iconic
engagements--the Battle of Shiloh.
It's the spring of 1862. The Confederate Army in the West teeters on the
brink of collapse following the catastrophic loss of Fort Donelson.
Commanding general Albert Sidney Johnston is forced to pull up stakes,
abandon the critical city of Nashville, and rally his troops in defense
of the Memphis and Charleston Railroad. Hot on Johnston's trail are two
of the Union's best generals: the relentless Ulysses Grant, fresh off
his career-making victory at Fort Donelson, and Don Carlos Buell. If
their combined forces can crush Johnston's army and capture the
railroad, the war in the West likely will be over. There's just one
problem: Johnston knows of the Union plans, and is poised to launch an
audacious surprise attack on Grant's encampment--a small settlement in
southwestern Tennessee anchored by a humble church named Shiloh.
With stunning you-are-there immediacy, Shaara takes us inside the
maelstrom of Shiloh as no novelist has before. Drawing on meticulous
research, he dramatizes the key actions and decisions of the commanders
on both sides: Johnston, Grant, Sherman, Beauregard, and the illustrious
Colonel Nathan Bedford Forrest. Here too are the thoughts and voices of
the junior officers, conscripts, and enlisted men who gave their all for
the cause, among them Confederate cavalry lieutenant James Seeley and
Private Fritz "Dutchie" Bauer of the 16th Wisconsin Regiment--brave
participants in a pitched back-and-forth battle whose casualty count
would far surpass anything the American public had yet seen in this war.
By the end of the first day of fighting, as Grant's bedraggled forces
regroup for could be their last stand, two major events--both totally
unexpected--will turn the tide of the battle and perhaps the war itself.
