I loved this book. It was one of those that I just could not put down. It transported me to a different place and time and I felt like I knew the characters. Turning the pages almost took too long. The story stayed in my mind long after I finished the book. The follow up book, On Leaving Charleston was just as good.
the best seller of a family and their city though war, tragedy, and triump
After reading Charleston, I was able to understand how the family of Margaret Mitchell could allow someone to write a sequel to GWTW. This book is an absolutely fantastic book about the life right before the Civil War and after it in Charleston. I love books about the South, and especially the Civil War, and this book and it sequel Leaving Charleston are no exception.
Very informative about what was happening politically and culturally during this time in Charleston as well as very descriptive about how domestic life of old families was lived. The characters are fascinating and varied.
"From the final years of the war to the reconstruction and into the ragtime era this is the struggle of one family and the city they love....Charleston."
Charleston is yet another one of Alexandra Ripley's historical fiction novels.
The book begins during the middle of the Civil War and continues on towards 1898. The story surrounds on the Charlestonians, all whom are related to each other somehow or the other. The Tradds, the family that it is focused on, is made up of Mary Tradd, a brainless beauty as the mother; Pinckney Tradd, the new head of the family since the father died during the war, he's worried about how he can bring money in for the family; Stuart Tradd, a young boy not even in his teens during the war, but decides that he's going to defeat the Yankees no matter what; and Lizzie Tradd, the youngest, who isn't quite like any other girl after the war.
