By Edward Achorn

With the coronavirus keeping people in more than usual, bookstores have been promoting lists of books that offer an escape from the tedium of being indoors.

I’m grateful that my new book, Every Drop of Blood, has appeared on several.

Gee Gee Rosell, writing for Buxton Village Books in the Island Free Press, chose Every Drop of Blood: The Momentous Second Inauguration of Abraham Lincoln as its top non-fiction book during the lockdown.

“A brilliantly conceived and vividly drawn story featuring 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,” Gee Gee’s story noted.

“I have to say that reading, and getting lost in the pages of a book, ranks right up there with walking on the beach for calming my soul. And reading on the beach is the best of both worlds.” she wrote.

Other recommended books for the lockdown included:

Fiction: If It Bleeds, by Stephen King.

Young Adult: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (a Hunger Games Novel) by Suzanne Collins.

Children’s Picture Book: How to Catch a Dinosaur, with Contributors Adam Wallace, (Author), and Andy Adam Elkerton, (Illustrator).

Not New But Still Great: Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens.

I’m also honored that Rhode Island’s Stillwater Books included Every Drop of Blood on its stack of books for lockdown reading. It’s exciting news that Stillwater is reopening with health precautions.

Hope you get lost in reading great books! And I can’t wait until bookstores around the nation reopen and browsing resumes.

(Edward Achorn is the author of three acclaimed books about American history.)