Soldier's Heart

IN JUNE 1861, when the Civil War began, Charley Goddard left his farm and enlisted in the First Minnesota Volunteers. He was fifteen. He didn't rightly know what a "shooting war" meant, or what he was fighting for. All he knew was that he didn't want to miss out on a great adventure.

The shooting war meant the horror of combat and the wild luck of survival. It meant knowing how it feels to cross a field toward the enemy, waiting for fire. Waiting for death. And Charley learned: This is how it's done.

When he entered the service he was a boy. When he came back he was different. He was only nineteen, but he was a man said to have "soldier's heart."

Battle by battle, Gary Paulsen shows one boy's war through one boy's eyes and one boy's heart, and gives a voice to all the anonymous young men who fought in the Civil War. Readers will finish this book and know: This is how it's done.