Unredeemed Land examines the ways the Civil War and the emancipation of the slaves reconfigured the South's natural landscape, revealing the environmental constraints that shaped the rural South's transition to capitalism during the late nineteenth century. [Amidst] the sesquicentennial of the Civil War ... Mauldin still found fresh soil to till ... in considering the impact of the war on land usage. ... She does a commendable job humanizing a potentially dry topic; her prose is lively, and she combines personalized accounts and moving journal entries with obligatory census data and government records. ... Essential.