Killer Angels Critique

Killer Angels Book Critique The book I chose to read this nine weeks was Killer Angels, by Michael Shaara. The book is historical fiction and is mostly a detailed account of the three days at battle in Gettysburg during the Civil War and the day leading up to it. Shaara chose to show many individual perspectives of each day and focuses a lot on the battle strategies and the characters. He barely even mentions slavery and the causes of the war, but more of the actual war itself and certain people fighting and leading in it. The character’s thoughts and feelings are where the fictional parts come in making it read more novel like. There was a large amount of characters, but the ones Shaara focused in the most were Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain,

Honestly there were parts that were a little boring in between all the action and fighting, but for the most part it kept me interested. One thing that I loved and hated was the use of so many characters so fast. For me, this made certain parts very confusing as I tried to put names with facts while getting certain characters mixed up. The beginning of the novel is harder to follow because of this. As time went on and I started to make my way through the book, this naturally became easier. I did appreciate the overview of each character in the foreward as it did help a lot at the beginning. Ultimately, this actually ended up adding to the story a lot, as a big focus of the book was on the characters. Shaara gives the reader a sense of connection to the characters and I started to feel for them when they had to make tough, morally challenging decisions and fight for their lives. I also liked and appreciated Shaara giving a more detailed southern perspective. It is easy to only see a war from the winning sides perspective and the side you agree with, but this book is different. I thought it was really interesting and beneficial to see the thought process behind many of the unsuccessful decisions that did not work out for both sides and why certain characters made the decisions they did. It gives more of an understanding as I was able to put myself in the character's shoes. Personally, I find the Civil War to be more

It is the beginning on the real action and kicks everything off very well. Lee is simply having a calm conversation with Longstreet when all of a sudden Lee hears the sound of gunshots. This immediately made me flip to the next chapter which was Buford’s. He begins hearing the shots as well. Shaara does a great job at adding suspense to the book. The noise builds from single shots to a single attack to cannon fire until its a full on battle. Buford needs Reynolds to come with the infantry or they will not be able to hold back the thousands of Confederates heading towards them. It becomes a race against time and left me wondering how everything was about to play out. Soon the Confederates take the upper hand and Buford is scared that they won’t be able to hold back the Confederates any longer. Just in time, Reynolds comes with his men. This is a huge relief and everything seem fine. That is until Reynold suddenly is killed at the end of the chapter which I found to be a shock as it came out of nowhere. I think this whole scene goes to show how fast circumstances can change in war. There wasn’t a huge sense of security for anyone at this time as most people probably knew someone who was fighting or was fighting themselves. The country was in full out war which is something that is hard to relate to today unless you’ve fought in the army yourself. Another