I have been to Charleston and Savannah several times, so I picked up this book to see if Mike Sigalas "got it right."

He certainly did.

This book not only tells you the things you ought to see, but also tells you things that you ought to know to really appreciate these two extraordinary places. For example, his extensive history sections help explain why these two cities are not simple clones of each other.

His small articles do not shy away from controversial topics. When writing about the very few remaining slave houses, for example, he explains how these humble structures were not torn down to obliterate any visible remembrance of the bad old days of slavery, but fell the same fate as almost every other working class house from that time.

The book has good maps and directions, and--best of all--in my estimation, it does not sound like it was written by the local Chamber of Commerce. Sigalas's humor comes through without feeling a need to show off.

This book is best read before you go to Charleston and/or Savannah. It will make your visit(s) so much better.

I adore this wonderful warm & funny woman and her wit! Too bad I discovered her before she left us. However, she lives on in her two books which are fantastic gifts for your favorite people. Her daughter also has authored a book on the plantation life of her gggrandmother. Enjoy!

I love this book. I am a teacher and have read it to and with children from 2nd to 6th grade. They get very excited about finding Silas and the history really comes alive for them. The illustrations are beautiful. The children were inspired to make their own drawings of Silas, and now we have quite a collection.

A historical fictional account of two brothers adventures in Charleston, SC. They are followed by a stranger with a peculiar walk. They seek a lost treasure from the pirate Stede Bonnett.

Doyle traces the transition years between Old South and New South in Atlanta, Nashville, Charleston and Mobile between 1860 and 1910. Wonderful compilation of both quantitative and qualitative sources; the sources from newspapers during the time act like time capsules into the period. The newspaper sources combined with some photographs and maps make Doyle's book a well-researched place for students of Southern history and culture to enjoy an insightful glimpse into particular loci in the south. Chapters include:
Preface
Acknowledgments
Urbanization of Dixie
The New Order of Things
Ebb Tide
Patrician and Parvenu
The Atlanta Spirit
The Charleston Style
New Class
Gentility and Mirth
The New Paternalism
Paternalism and Pessimism
Epilogue
Notes
Index

Students interested in the too-often forgetten urban south should get this book

The life of Susan Pringle Frost, the Mother of Historic Preservation in Charleston, is explored with perception and sensitivity by Dr. Sidney R. Bland, whom I had the honor of assisting with a small portion of his research. Her father, Dr. Francis L. Frost, a brave Confederate surgeon, spent an angonizing and wholly fruitless decade after the end of the Civil War trying to re-start rice planting on his family's rice plantations on South Carolina's North Santee River. After his failure (and none of his neighbors fared any better), he turned to several other occupations, each of which proved equally fruitless. "Miss Sue," as she was called, along with her two sisters, rose above the limitations of her aristocratic breeding and lent a shoulder to the wheel, taking outside jobs to provide the failed family with an income. Southern gentlewomen that they were, they gave all their earnings to their father, in order that he might remain the titular head of the family. Miss Sue's rise from martyr to the Lost Cause to court stenographer to Charleston's leading Suffragette to the city's first real estate agent to its pioneer historic preservationist blazed the trail for many women both in Charleston and outside the Palmetto State. Sidney Bland's unblinking yet compassionate study of Miss Sue and her era is a precious insight into the rapidly-changing face of the South in the early twentieth century. -- Richard N. Cote', author of Mary's World: Love, War, and Family Ties in Nineteenth-century Charleston (Corinthian Books, 2001).

'Seizing the New Day' is a wonderful book about enslaved southerners of Charleston, South Carolina freeing themselves. They are 'seizing the new day,' no gifts are discussed here. They are a somewhat surly group, quick to anger, but careful to keep long term goals in mind. They are still a surly group at the book's end, but they have made a lot of progress.

The focus is very narrow, but richly detailed. We only follow the events in Charleston. Who lived next to whom? What church did they go to? What school did they attend? Who did they marry?

This is a story of the 'Civil War.' Told from the street level of Charleston between 1850 and 1870, it twists the 'accepted story' presented by Hollywood. I'm used to the Civil War starting with the shelling of Fort Sumter and ending with Lee's surrender at Appomattox. This version of the 'Civil War' starts with the Nat Turner rebellion and ends with the 15th amendment. Instead of the great establishment leaders like Jefferson Davis and Abraham Lincoln, this war is fought by people that won't abide with bondage. It is a war between slave owners and those they seek to dominate.

There is no talk of a Northern Army 'freeing' people, the most prominent army unit mentioned is the 21st United States Colored Troops. The mayor of Charleston surrendered the city to them on February 18, 1865.

The book is organized into 7 chapters. The first two and last are narrative, the war story. Chapters 3 through 6 develop sub themes regarding how the winners of the war (remember, the Mayor surrendered to colored troops) went about establishing economic, educational and community institutions for 'the New Day.'

The book is careful to bolster its case by retelling hundreds of stories pulled from contemporary sources; autobiographies, newspapers, government documents, etc. Anyone writing a civil war film script would find this book a welcome source of authentic street scenes.

Despite the bold title, the notion of 'seizing liberty' is rather hidden in the multitude of individual stories recounted here. It's easy to read the book as a colorful recap of many small and disconnected efforts. I suspect this reflects the author's desire to maintain academic respectability. The story about Lee and Grant is, after all, the accepted version.

Does for Charleston what "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" did for Savannah. Marvelous cast of characters. Wonderfully funny and a take-off of everything southern. Enjoyed it immensely!

Milby's "Siege of Charleston" is a must for those who want to know the full scope of the war, particularly the naval war, in the "Cradle of the Rebellion." Fort Sumter, Secessionists, Union monitors and blockaders, Southern rams and submarines, forts, soldiers, and heroics on all sides are woven together in this great one-volume history. Highly recommended.

Harlan Greene dredged up memories I had long ago allowed to gather dust and cobwebs. As a fellow southerner, I found myself remembering the same lonely feelings of disassociation as I grew into purberty. I remembered my longing for being one of the gang. However, I have to confess, that Greene's book took several turns I never thought it would. The ending is so mind boggling that I wouldn't have dared to guess the story's outcome. This is no Stephen King or Jeffrey Archer novel, with simple writing done for the brain dead. The prose in this book is very reminescent of Catcher in the Rye. You really have to love to read and to love discovering a book to fully appreciate Greene's work. While I'm bored to tears with the typical gay AIDS era novel - this one is different - leaps and bounds beyond any other I've ever read. If you can secure a copy, you'll have a real treasure.