A brilliantly conceived and vividly drawn story-Washington, D.C. on the eve of Abraham Lincoln's historic second inaugural address as the lens through which to understand all the complexities of the Civil War

Edward Achorn, a Pulitzer Prize finalist for Commentary and winner of the Yankee Quill Award, is the author of two acclaimed books about nineteenth-century baseball and American culture, Fifty-nine in '84 and The Summer of Beer and Whiskey. He lives in an 1840s farmhouse in Rehoboth, Massachusetts.