What is the setting in the novel, The March?

The book is set in three Southern states during the American Civil War. When it opens, General Sherman's army is making its way through Georgia, burning everything in its path and picking up an odd collection of freed slaves and other refugees along the way. Although a work of fiction, the book also includes a great deal of documented history such as Sherman's occupation of Savannah and other specific locations.

The book's second section takes place in South Carolina and the final section in North Carolina. Again, the book's characters follow the documented path of Sherman's army as it occupies cities such as Columbia, South Carolina and moves on to Raleigh, North Carolina. Along the way, the action takes place on plantations, in cities and small towns, in prisons and makeshift military hospitals, and in the homes taken over and often destroyed by Union troops. The author uses a wide variety of settings as a device for exploring the ways in which the war affected not only the characters depicted in the book, but also the actual geographic locations in which significant events took place.