The Children of Blood

James examines the utter futility of war, as seen through the eyes of two teenagers in a bereaved Kentucky farm family during the Civil War, in this melancholy second novel (after Fly Away, Little Sparrow). The morosely philosophical plot takes inspiration from an 1864 dispatch from General Sheridan to General Grant in which he reported burning all houses within a five mile radius of Dayton, Ohio, in retaliation for the murder of one of his officers. Told in the alternating voices of 14-year-old Andrew and his 19-year-old sister, Sabina, the narrative recounts a senseless series of tragedies visited upon the Kincaids, who have already been stricken by the deaths of their father and brother. Alerted that a Union patrol is burning the homes in their valley, elderly Grumpa Kincaid arms Andrew, Sabina and a neighbor boy and takes a stand, believing he can persuade the marauders to turn back. The Yankee officer fires upon them; in the ensuing skirmish, all but one of his seven troops are killed. The surviving soldier is taken in by the Kincaids and treated for his wounds. Aided by a loyal former slave couple, the Kincaids bury the evidence and await the inevitable. When Sabina attempts to barter herself to spare the house from the torch, she courts disaster. James contrasts disgraceful abuse of trust and authority with purity of spirit, love and kindness. Yet her prose is labored and the voices of Andrew and Sabina, especially as Sabina slips into despondency toward the end, are not entirely convincing. A wistful vestige of a Romeo and Juliet romance is wasted and retribution is relegated to a hollow afterthought in this curiously unfinished fable about the vagaries of fate. (Oct.)