DWD's Reviews

An excellent beginning to a promising career. Howard Bahr First off - The Black Flower is one of the best books I've read in a long time. It follows a group of Confederate soldiers during and after the Battle of Franklin, Tennessee (November of 1864), especially an educated Private named Bushrod Carter. I will not go into great detail, for fear of ruining the plot for others. For a first book, this is a remarkable work. The characters are well-written and "feel" like real people. They have weight and depth, a feature that many readers and writers on this forum have decried as missing in most of modern literature. They speak in dialect that is easy to read and does not take much decoding (as opposed to some of Twain's). I am a Civil War buff, and I can testify that the historical aspects of the story ring true. Confederate Soldiers This book reminded me very much of The Red Badge of Courage , but not in its theme or its plot. It reminded m...

Majestic and Poetic - an Outstanding Experience Published in 2007 by Picador Howard Bahr If you pick up The Judas Field give it about 30 pages. Up to that point I was fairly confused and lost. Then, it suddenly comes together and this book became one of the most powerful books I've read all year. The book features two story lines - one set approximately 20 years after the Civil War and one that consists of flashbacks about the Battle of Franklin. Both are interesting. Bahr's descriptions of the battle contain some of the most poetic descriptions of the most awful things that men can do to one another that I've ever read. Truly beautifully written. On top of that there is an ongoing discussion about the role of God in war. Does he take sides? Has he forsaken both sides? This discussion is not done lightly. These are not post-modernist characters - they believe in God but they must reconcile that belief with the awful experience of war - what they did,...

The Year of Jubilo is the second book by Bahr that I've read. In fact, I bought this one because I enjoyed his novel, The Black Flower: A Novel of the Civil War so much. This book is different than the The Black Flower: A Novel of the Civil War , which was heavy on texture and feel. This book is every bit the equal of the first, but much more focused on plot and theme. So, what is the theme? It's in the title. The Year of Jubilo refers to the Old Testament Hebrew tradition called the Year of Jubilee. Every 7 years, all slaves were forever released from bondage. This novel explores freedom of all sorts in a (barely) post-Civil War Alabama town. There is, obviously, the newly-won freedom of the slaves, but that is barely brushed upon in favor of deeper themes. There is freedom (or not) from the past, guilt, the entanglements of family, family honor, regional honor, friendship, obligations of social position and even love. All of this is mostly told through two characte...