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| BrendanMcKillip.com brendan mckillip's daily journal |
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daily journal
I've Been Reading Last year I read The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara and was overwhelmed with the powerful writing and insightful characterizations. It was clearly the highest rated book I read in all of 2004.  Michael's son Jeff, an accomplished writer in his own right, took it upon himself to build on his dad's Pulitzer winning novel and wrote to works to bookend The Killer Angels. Gods and Generals focuses on the events from the start of the Civil War up to before the Battle of Gettysburg, and The Last Full Measure which recounts the end of the war. After finishing The Killer Angels I was very much interested in reading the other two books.Yesterday I finished Gods and Generals, and while I enjoyed it tremendously, I think I was expecting The Killer Angels again. Jeff does an excellent job of recreating the events of the war and comes close to matching the tone of his father's writing, but ultimately I wasn't as impressed with the novel as I was with The Killer Angels. Jeff, like his father, has obviously meticulously researched the Civil War before beginning to write. The book is full of all the details I came to expect. What was lacking was the same depth on insight into the men who fought the war. Jeff seems to focus most of his energies on Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee. They really are the stars of the novel. Winfield Scott Hancock gets considerable attention, but not nearly that of the two Confederate generals. Although, Jeff wonderfully illustrates how the revolving door of top generals effectively rendered the Union Army toothless against the Confederate forces. From my studying of the Civil War I knew that all the changes at leadership prevented the Army of the Potomac from ending the rebellion quickly, but Jeff's novel brings it to life such that I ended up sharing the frustration of General Hancock, General Couch, and the like in their army inability to win the war when they had bigger numbers and were better supplied than the rebels. Another aspect of the writing that I noticed was how I felt Jeff failed to bring the intensity to the battle scenes that I remember from The Killing Angels. His descriptions lacked the raw emotions and frantic activity that his father so vividly brought to life in his book. The war scenes are horrific, don't get me wrong. I just felt that they didn't display the brutality of the fighting that went on in the Civil War I think I was judging this book on two levels. At once an entertaining historical novel on it's own, and the same time a comparison of father and son in writing skills. On the first point it clearly scored high marks. Gods and Generals is a wonderful read, especially if you enjoy Civil War, or even early American history. As a comparison of father and son, I have to give Michael the edge and ultimately it flavors my overall impression of the book. It's a great novel, but it's no The Killer Angels  A couple weeks ago the comic book store I frequent had a huge sale on all DC trade paperbacks. I took full advantage of the sale, picking up some books I really wanted to read. One of those books was Grant Morrison's and Frank Quitely's JLA: Earth 2. This was originally published back 2001 after Morrison had wrapped up his run on the regular monthly JLA title. It's a stand-alone graphic novel in which the JLA of Earth become aware of different version of Earth in an anti-matter universe with super-powered beings of its own. There the Crime Syndicate of Amerika rules the world with an iron fist and Alexander Luthor fights to free the people of Earth (or Earth 2) from the CSA's grip. Essentially, on Earth 2 what is good here is evil there, what is evil here is good there, and evil always wins in the end on Earth 2.What I loved about Morrison's run on JLA was his completely mad ideals and concepts. The guy's brain is twisted like nothing I have ever seen. What I think hurt his run on JLA was the artist DC teamed with him. Nearly all of Morrison's JLA stories were brought to the page by the pencil work of Howard Porter - whose style is ill-suited to bring Morrison's larger-than-life ideas to life on the page. Luckily, such is not the case with JLA: Earth 2. Frank Quitely is more than capable of giving Morrison's story and grand concepts the visual punch they deserve. Quitely still draws some of the homeliest women I have ever seen (making the seduction scene by Superwoman hard to believe), but over all he captures and executes graphically at a level that Porter was never able to reach. I think you know where I am going with this review. I get an over the top superhero story supported by an artist with the skills to match up with the mad Morrison concepts being presented. It was a great read. I'm really glad I picked it up. posted by Brendan | 12:56 PM | permanent link |
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