10/25/2006

New books and good news

The good people at Indigo Custom Publishing have notified me that Mikell Harper has authored The Second Georgia Infantry
Regiment
. "Well researched, The Second Georgia Infantry Regiment is a compilation of first hand accounts of those who fought or those who loved the soldiers of Burke's Sharpshooters, the color company (Company D) of the Second Georgia Infantry Regiment." Very nice website, too (linked above). 
 
Thanks also to Simon & Schuster for review copies of two titles with terrific potential.
 
Lincoln & Chief Justice Taney is a strong, natural idea and S&S is to be commended for trying to bring this to a mass audience (it will appear next month). I can't stop reading (and criticizing) it. More on this soon.
 
By the same token, Gabor Boritt's Gettysburg Gospel puts Boritt himself front and center in a book-length work of his own (not others') ideas. We know Boritt is aligned with a particular faction of Linconology but we also know he is interesting based on his compilations - and this book is historiographic and revisionist, making it irresistible to me.
 
If this is a new direction in Civil War trade publishing, I want to encourage, commend, promote. I feel as though "the trades" are at last reaching out to us, the advanced readers. Bless 'em.
 
I have lots of quarrels with both books - as you might expect. We'll save those for other posts. Meanwhile, go S&S!