Manassas

The Civil War Battle Series, Book 1

By: James Reasoner

Narrated by: LLoyd James

Storm clouds are approaching Culpeper County, Virginia, in early January 1861. The troublesome Fogarty brothers have been raising havoc across the countryside, and when the local lawman, Will Brannon, returns from another futile attempt to track them down, he finds the townspeople abuzz. South Carolina has seceded from the Union, and rumor has it more states will follow, perhaps even Virginia. Will enlists, but so, too, do the Fogartys. All know that men die in battle and that these deaths are never investigated.

As the Brannon brothers answer the call to arms, the family finds itself struggling with dilemmas it never had considered.

Find out what happens to the Brannon family in the rest of the Civil War Battle Series.©1999 James Reasoner (P)2000 Blackstone Audiobooks

Critic reviews

"Reasoner spins a lively, suspenseful yarn." (Publishers Weekly)
"Fraught with tension, drama, and tantalizing hints of future romance, this vividly rendered family saga will hook fans of meaty historical fiction." (Booklist)

Good read!

What did you love best about Manassas?

Good story line leading up to the war.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Will is a well rounded and believable character. .

If you could rename Manassas, what would you call it?

Why War!

Western style historical fiction...

This does plod along but dang it, it keeps you reading. Definitely slanted to the southern take on things. Somewhat interesting fictional characters. The historical details and characters are quite good. There was valid reason that this read like an historical western about the Civil War. Reasoner has numerous pen names, nearly twenty, such as Jake Logan, Jon Sharpe(western), Dana Fuller Ross(historical fiction), etc.. He‘s accredited with writing over 350 novels. I‘m carrying on with book two. The reader is to be commended, well done!

Great Characters

I love history, but I'm not good at remembering all the dates and facts. So I started reading historical fictions where there is a story and characters intertwined with historical fact. I happen to love this series even though I'm only on the 3rd book. I also want to give credit where credit is due to the narrator LLoyd James. He has made each character come alive. I have listened to other books with only a few characters and they all sound the same. Thank you Mr James. And thank you Mr. Reasoner for writing 10 great books.

Good book

Enjoyed reading this book kept my intrest all the way throut the book. Good narratot.

A Good, Fast Read

A simple plot with excellent narration that captures the time and place and the many voices. I wasn’t sure why the book was titled Manassas until the final chapters. Underneath a story of revenge seeking and retribution with the early days of the Civil War as the backdrop.

Manassas

This is a good book about the Civil War. It's all about one family. I've been trying to find a book that I could get into about the civil war and I couldn't stop listening to this. This book starts before the war started. I do not like there Mother. There is a lot of books in this series and it follows the whole family. Lloyd James did a great job narrating this book. If my review is any help will you please click on the helpful link below. Thank you.

James Reasoner

This is an Excellent book, well read, full of excellent details.
I fell in love with Mac horse.

Well with the listen.

I don’t know why this book is not more widely know . If you are into a first person look at the civil war this is a great one to listen too

good background fiction...not much civil war

This is an enjoyable story - but as the first in a series it's focus has to be to build the foundation for a broad array of characters. As a result there is actually very little devoted to Manassas itself. I will purchase the next in the series, however, as I think ther series has potential to develop further in the later books.

Feuding and fighting

This book is clearly establishing characters for what promises to be a long and interesting soap opera of a tale of the civil war from the point of view of a southern farmers family rather than from a planter's or general's view point which is the normal fare for novels.

The narrator does a good job with bringing the accents to the characters and keeping the energy running thru the story.

Manassas is the appetiser with the main courses still to come.