Civil War Adventure

'Civil War Adventures, Book One' is a series of illustrated retellings of stories from the Civil War. I enjoyed it quite a bit.

The stories are told in no particular order. The book provides a timeline of the war and shows when the stories take place there. There are stories of snipers and farmboys and fathers who find themselves in the path of war. There are letters to loved ones. We meet Mosby who made a famous raid behind enemy lines. We meet deserters who only want to get home to sick family and failing crops. We meet Darnel Dingus who seems to have managed to make it into a famous painting for his lack of brains.

Many of the stories are prefaced with brief information. It seems like the stories are more from the Confederacy side of things, but I think a lot of the experiences were not uncommon. It feels a bit like these were cut out of a larger work and pasted back in a different order. It gives some of the stories a strange or abrupt ending, but it didn't detract from my enjoyment. I loved the art. It's very detailed and at times has a bit of caricature feel, but it brings everything to life very well.

I received a review copy of this graphic novel from Dover Publications and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you for allowing me to review this graphic novel.

As a lover of history I hate to hear people say that history is boring. I always reply that history is not boring, historians are boring. Some noble attempts are being made to make history approachable and enjoyable. Chuck Dixon’s Civil War Adventure is one such project. This is an outstanding piece of historical writing. Dixon builds a series of interlacing stories to tell the story of the Civil War. The stories move around all over the war. He uses both fictional and historical characters to tell the stories. The writing is masterful and is paired with the outstanding art work of Gary Kwapisz. I started reading Civil War history when I was 12 years old. I would have devoured this book at that time. I highly recommend this to anyone, but in particular this is the kind of book that you can get for a younger person and turn them into lovers of history for life. I hope that Dixon will continue to write more such books.

This was such a fun and education read. This semi-graphic novel combines illustrations and text to education young children on the Civil War. The book reads as if targeted for children ages 7+, however it doesn't feel dumbed down or anything of that manner that might detract from it's educational merit.

We get a presentation of events and then followed by an illustrated story that incorporates what was just read. My absolute favorite was the map of the U.S. at the time and the war's timeline; it presented key points that were easy to follow without becoming boring or tedious. If you're looking for a fun, educational read, my inner child recommends this one.

Rating 5 out of 5 Read@Book

Here is a review by Jezire: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1292967051

Would recommend this fast past, historically researched graphic novel for Civil War enthusiasts, history buffs, and people who enjoy war stoires.

If you are looking for a quick introduction to the grit of the American Civil War for upper elementary/middle school students, Civil War Adventure will be one of the books to recommend. There is a nice mix of adventure with vignettes of history nicely illustrated in black and white. The book recommendations provide an opportunity to discuss viewpoint and authorial bias in history. In all a much better collection than I first thought.

A reprint of a book with a limited run originally published in 2009. This graphic novel is a series of short stories that combine to tell the story of the Civil War mostly through the viewpoint of a father and son serving under Stonewall Jackson. It's an incredibly readable history volume with real facts except for the fictional father & son. Different presentations are used throughout from single pages of text to maps to frames of comics with only narrative to full comic style with speech bubbles. Interspersed between the story of the adventures of Ty and his father as they join the Confederate Army and go off to war are shorter stories of famous people (ie Custer), other events (ie an ironclad) and letters home from various soldiers in the field. This is a harsh look at war, death, disease, depression, desertion. While there are a few episodes from the "Federalist" side, the book decidedly shows the war from the "successionist" point of view and makes a point of making slavery *not* the point of the war for the average volunteer farmer or mountain boy who signed up. Also of interest are one-page history lessons on such topics as certain guns in use, the birth of the sniper, certain famous people, battles, and campaigns. I enjoy reading about the Civil War, especially of the South, and fully enjoyed this. It's not in-depth but gives a good overview for a student or is simply entertaining and informative for any age.

This was a graphic novel which depicted some battles and stories of the Civil War. There was some good information and a student who really likes reading about the Civil War would probably finds parts that he or she enjoyed. I found the book to be confusing. It started with a section about snipers, then told bits about a boy and his father who enlisted. These two characters showed up periodically in the book but there was never any closure to their story. There were also episodes about Bull Run, Gettysburg, Custer, and more. The flow of the book as a whole was off for me though.

I received an advance e-copy of this book, but it was not legible on a basic Kindle. I could read it on my iPad or computer, but even that was unsatisfactory as you had to enlarge each page and then shrink to move to the next, it killed the flow. So I bought a physical copy, which is what I am basing this review on. I do not recommend an electronic version if one becomes available, unless the publisher invests in a thorough reformatting.

This is a surprisingly old-fashioned comic both in style and message. That's not necessarily bad, but it will remind you more of [[ASIN:B00PSVA9DY War Report]] or [[ASIN:1853756989 War Picture Library]] from the 1950s than modern graphic novels or manga. There is no cinematic feel, just panels of exaggerated facial expressions and frozen action scenes (the stories often start with a full page panel with extensive text and background, and there are a few orientation panels and out-of-panel drawings, but it's mostly faces and static fights). The dialog is stilted as it has to convey most of the story, characters often stand around telling each other what both would already know.

This can be an effective style, and the author has updated it somewhat. The pages are visually interesting as wholes, and the eye is naturally drawn to the panel sequence. At its best, it draws the reader in so it's telling a story in her mind. The stories have to be pretty linear, with simple exaggerated emotion. That's appropriate for many middle school readers, and can be entertaining for adults who like that sort of thing (I do, when it's done as well as this). You won't get evocation of moods or imagine that you can feel and smell the story, like great manga can do, but the author has a few tricks up his sleeve to startle your perception of the stories and suggest thoughts and emotions more subtle than he can draw on the faces.

The portrayal of war is also consistent with the 1950s, before novels like [[ASIN:1451626657 Catch-22]] or the insanity of Vietnam and Afghanistan. There's no sense that the conflict is meaningless, the officers crazy and the politicians corrupt; just that war is scary, boring, miserable, frustrating, enraging and emotionally and psychologically intolerable. The stories, like many soldiers, can only try to make sense of the immediate situation, avoiding death, protecting friends, getting to the next place.

There's quite a bit of interesting historical detail but it's all conveyed in words, none of it is in the drawings. So it's educational, but the educational part is distinct from the action.

Overall, this is a very well produced comic that will capture the attention of a reasonable proportion of middle-school-age boys, plus a few girls and some precocious younger children, and teach them interesting stuff most adults don't know, in fact probably that most college American History majors don't know. It's certainly readable for older children and adults as well. It delivers a sobering and realistic picture of some aspects of war in the 19th century, and in some cases of all wars at all times, although it is a less cynical and critical view than many people have today.

Good graphic novel treatment of the Civil War.