The Civil War is an interesting topic, here in the States.  There is an great deal of confusion and hypocrisy surrounding it and the events and politics around it, foremost being slavery.  Harry Turtledove is the master of alternate history fiction, and crafts the conflict into what is considered his best book.  I have read others of his, but always intended to read this one.

The Guns of the Southis told from the point of view of two very different personalities.  One is Nate Caudell, a 1st Sergeant of the Confederacy, and the other the infamous Robert E Lee.  As it becomes apparent that the war is lost for the South, a mysterious group of men introduce a new type of rifle to General Lee they call the AK-47.  Armed with the assault rifles and the ammunition to use them, the war quickly turns, as expected.  Without giving too much away, the first half of the book concerns the war and its conclusion very well, and the second half, the events after the war which prove even more complex than imagined.

Turtledove is an excellent author who has a great ability to show the surrounding issues equally well as the primary.  He attacks the idea that the Civil War was simply about slavery swiftly and competently, casts Lee in the light of the reluctant hero, and shows Lincoln as a man of integrity desperate to save the United States.  One of the review quotes on the reverse of the paperback edition suggests that every one studying Civil War history should read this book.  I think that should be expanded to everyone, except the people in the area of Virginia that I live in who think the Confederate Battle Flag is about "heritage":  they should read it twice.