The True Story Of Manse Jolly Part I: As told by The Hon. A.W. Fries

by Steve Biondo

The True Story Of Manse Jolly, Part IIn 1862, two young South Carolina volunteers forged a brotherhood that stood the test of battle. One lived to tell their tale....Encompassing one of the most tumultuous decades in American history, this two-volume work of fiction tells the mostly true tale of a tough, rawboned farmer and a naive law graduate whose paths cross one uneventful day and whose fates are forever after intertwined.

242 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

Reviews

[Michael Wiggins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Steve Biondo was one of my professors in college, and was a fine newspaperman as well. He worked as a reporter and columnist for the Anderson Independent-Mail and then as a feature writer for the Laurens County Advertiser in South Carolina. I read just a few snippets of his fiction writing back in the day, mainly when he was teaching us how to handle criticism and to expect many rejection letters if we were going to try making a living from being a writer.

This book, "The True Story of Manse Jolly Part 1," while a work of fiction in execution, is the product of years of research on Biondo's part and contains both a great deal of truth and much of the legend surrounding Manse Jolly. Unreconstructed rebels and pro-Yankee revisionists alike will find something to like and something to mourn in this book.