Battle Lines: A Graphic History of the Civil War #[nn]

Framed like a period broadside complete with a spread-eagle emblem, the cover of this 2015 Farrar, Straus, and Giroux graphic history pulls you straight into the chaos of the Civil War — uniformed soldiers clash and strain across both flanks, a woman in a striped dress stands her ground amid the fray, and lantern light cuts through the earthy sepia tones of Jonathan Fetter-Vorm's densely composed artwork. Writers Jonathan Fetter-Vorm and Ari Kelman promise a graphic approach to one of American history's most wrenching conflicts, and the cover's collage of desperate faces — Union caps, Confederate gear, and civilians caught between — signals that this is history told from the ground up. If you've been looking for a comics treatment of the Civil War with genuine weight and craft, *Battle Lines* looks like a compelling place to start.