For all his concerns, his heart leapt at the prospect of fighting again. Lee smelled powder the way a horse smelled oats. There were things he dared not discuss with other men, matters he preferred not to think on too much himself. He loved war, that was the wicked truth. God forgive him, he loved it. Worse, this army had become his greatest love. It was a terrible thing for a man of faith, or any man, to recognize.

I wonder if it’s possible for a novel to be too successful. Not in the marketing sense – though there are certain authors whose success, in my opinion, is unmerited – but in the artistic sense. A novel that does such a good job of fulfilling its creative goals that the experience becomes nearly unendurable for the reader. Due to the subject matter.

That was my problem with Ralph Peters’ Hell or Richmond, a fantastically successful attempt to bring to life the experience of the 1864 Overland Campaign, during the American Civil War. Like his earlier novel, Cain at Gettysburg (which I admired greatly and reviewed here), it resurrects the historical events on both the macro and the micro level. Peters is a marvelous prose stylist, and succeeds in conveying not only the sights and sounds, but especially the sensations – the weariness, the thirst, the pervasive discomforts from an infantryman’s poison ivy to an officer’s inflamed feet, to Robert E. Lee’s digestive ailments. And the suffering goes on and on, far worse than Gettysburg, which seemed bad enough – through the Wilderness and Spotsylvania Courthouse to Cold Harbor, all of them famous slaughters.

Robert E. Lee is less than a demigod in this depiction, though far from contemptible. But he’s doing a harder and harder job with ever fewer resources, and his bad health interferes with his job performance. Grant is an enigma, sitting far behind the lines, seemingly (though not really, as we learn) unmoved by the appalling losses his Army of the Potomac is suffering. His eye is on the big picture – on wearing Lee down at any cost. Unlike his predecessor generals, he has no mercy on his own men.

It’s all fascinating, but I found it nearly overwhelming. It’s hard to imagine how anyone survived the Overland Campaign; I almost wondered how I survived reading about it. It wore me down, even in print.

Hell or Richmond is a great, great war novel. But I’m not sure I can bear such another. Cautions for foul language, adult themes, and blood and carnage on a stunning scale.