Booknotes: Decisions at Second Manassas

New Arrival:
• Decisions at Second Manassas: The Fourteen Critical Decisions That Defined the Battleby Matt Spruill III & Matt Spruill IV (Univ of Tenn Pr, 2018).

Released very soon after Decisions at Stones River, Decisions at Second Manassas: The Fourteen Critical Decisions That Defined the Battle is the second volume from UT Press's Command Decisions in America's Civil War series. At least early on, the various Spruills are the primary contributors, but the work of other authors is already in the pipeline.

From the description: "Decisions at Second Manassas introduces readers to critical decisions made by Confederate and Union commanders. Matt Spruill III and Matt Spruill IV examines the decisions that shaped the way the campaign and battle unfolded. Rather than offering a history of the Battle of Second Manassas, the Spruills focus on the critical decisions, those decisions that had a major impact on both Federal and Confederate forces in shaping the progression of the battle as we know it today. This account is designed to present the reader with a coherent and manageable blueprint of the battle’s development. Exploring and studying the critical decisions allows the reader to progress from an understand of “what happened” to “why events happened” as they did."

I very briefly discussed the general format already in the Stones River Booknotes entry (see link above). It doesn't look like the publisher has a dedicated series page up yet on their website, but page 11 of their Spring/Summer '18 catalog features the series. Mentioned in current development is Decisions at Chattanooga from Larry Peterson. Not shown is David Powell's Decisions at Chickamauga. Other planned volumes cover Perryville, Tullahoma, Shiloh and "other notable battles both in the Eastern and Western theaters of the Civil War."