Also included are personal anecdotes from the soldiers at the battlefront and the civilians at home, as well as profiles of historical luminaries such as Robert E. Lee, Abraham Lincoln, Jefferson Davis, and Ulysses S. Grant. McPherson also explores the varied roles that women played during the war, healthcare on the battlefield, and the demise of slavery.

McPherson's narrative is highlighted with black-and-white photographs taken by Civil War photographers Mathew Brady and Timothy O'Sullivan, period oil paintings, and key campaign and battlefield maps, that make Fields of Fury the consummate book on the American Civil War for kids.

The well-organized, well-executed, kid-friendly history of the Civil War was a brilliant idea if there ever was one. It's difficult to imagine anyone doing a better job than McPherson at breaking down this complex, interrelated series of events into such compelling and easily digestible chunks. Except for a handful of longer entries, each major battle and section receives a single, concise, two-page spread that includes McPherson's summary and analysis, eyewitness accounts from all sides of the conflict (many from kids!), a few "Quick Facts," as well as carefully chosen maps, photographs, and other illustrations (some of which, appropriately, border on the macabre, a fact kids will appreciate). Fields of Fury also includes a glossary, an index, a list of related Web sites, a bibliography, and a timeline in the endpapers.

McPherson succeeds not just by grabbing attention and keeping it, but by doing so with such economy--and never without context that relates each entry back to the whole. (In fact, grownups who lacked the time or interest to weather McPherson's 904-page Battle Cry shouldn't be surprised if they find themselves "borrowing" Fields of Fury after their kids hit the sack.) (Ages 9 to 12) --Paul Hughes