tarmstrong112's review against another edition
3.0
This was okay. There were portions of the book that I enjoyed very much, especially the section dealing with the Battle of the Wilderness and when Hayes is in the hospital in Washington. But there are also great lengths of this book that I found dull. And it took my an incredibly long time to even start enjoying the book, well over 70 pages. It's a good story and touches on a topic (PTSD in the Civil War) that isn't addressed all that often. But I just feel it didn't stick the landing.
jaymay22's review
2.0
I really couldn't get into this book. It seemed to me that the writer was trying way too hard to sound poetic. And the flip-flopping between memories and the present was confusing when listening on audiobook.
kimberchuck's review
3.0
This was a tough one to rate. I wasn't sure I really enjoyed it, but kept listening because I hoped it would get less confusing, but it didn't. The story was being told in three different time periods, and listening to this as an audiobook was at first very difficult to keep track of which time period I was in. Then it got more confusing, but in a good way. The fact that there was PTSD in the Civil War and the reaction of society was interesting. In the end, I liked it, I didn't love it but was glad I'd made it to the end.
ledn7d's review
3.0
I won this book as a giveaway on Goodreads. There were parts of this book I really liked. I think McFarland does an excellent job of portraying the confusion and fear of a young man in battle. The hospital scenes are wonderfully written. You really feel as if you're experiencing the environment right along with Summerfield. That being said, I just have a hard time with novels that integrate historical figures into otherwise purely fictional story lines. Overall, Nostalgia is extremely well written and gives a unique take on the life of a Civil War soldier.
rosseroo's review
3.0
The title refers to the tentative diagnosis given Summerfield Hayes, a 19-year-old Union soldier lying mute in a hospital following three horrific days in the Battle of the Wilderness. Before we get there though, the first third of the book sets up his unusual life in Brooklyn -- he and his sister were orphaned and live in relative luxury with servants, and he is one of the city's leading baseball stars. However, he faces an untenable situation that drives him to enlist.
His introduction to army life is briefly covered, and soon enough he is thrust into the maelstrom of the confusing battle. Disoriented and suffering from post-traumatic stress, he wakes in the hospital in Washington, where some caregivers are sympathetic and some thing he is faking in order to avoid being send back to his unit. However, the most notable aspect is that the poet Walt Whitman is his frequent visitor and becomes his friend.
The book has the hazy languid feel of the hospital's morphine-dosed patients, drifting in and out of consciousness beneath a mosquito net, with the sewage scent of the nearby canal wafting through. The chapters move back and forth in time, returning Summerfield to home and to battle, as he slowly mends. As a work of atmosphere and craft, I find it more to be admired than to be enjoyed. And of course, "enjoyed" is probably not the right word to use about a work centering around a young man's PTSD -- what I mean to say is that it's such a deliberate and empathetic that it makes for equally deliberate reading for which one must be in the mood for.
His introduction to army life is briefly covered, and soon enough he is thrust into the maelstrom of the confusing battle. Disoriented and suffering from post-traumatic stress, he wakes in the hospital in Washington, where some caregivers are sympathetic and some thing he is faking in order to avoid being send back to his unit. However, the most notable aspect is that the poet Walt Whitman is his frequent visitor and becomes his friend.
The book has the hazy languid feel of the hospital's morphine-dosed patients, drifting in and out of consciousness beneath a mosquito net, with the sewage scent of the nearby canal wafting through. The chapters move back and forth in time, returning Summerfield to home and to battle, as he slowly mends. As a work of atmosphere and craft, I find it more to be admired than to be enjoyed. And of course, "enjoyed" is probably not the right word to use about a work centering around a young man's PTSD -- what I mean to say is that it's such a deliberate and empathetic that it makes for equally deliberate reading for which one must be in the mood for.
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