Why historical fiction?
Confession: I don’t read a lot of historical fiction.
To be fair, these days I read a lot more nonfiction than novels, but historical fiction has never loomed large on my radar. As a kid I loved the Dear America series (especially the ones that featured a romantic plotline) and as an adult I discovered the sheer genius of Philippa Gregory. In my humble opinion, The Other Boleyn Girl is a masterpiece. The narrator’s voice, the structure, the dramatic irony...it’s perfect and anyone who hasn’t read it should immediately pick it up.
But I also think historical fiction has a reputation for being a bit...dry. I think this reputation is unfair, and if I can do anything to help change that perception I would be very happy. There are a few points of struggle that I encountered while writing The Turncoat in Carrington Park, and I did my best to avoid the following pitfalls:
Sounding like a history textbook
While researching for historical fiction, you read a lot of history texts. These can range from primary sources to biographies to timelines to military history books. You know what you see a lot of in these texts? Dates. Lots and lots (and lots) of dates. Obviously, dates are important for the sake of accuracy (though more on that in a minute) but I wasn’t writing a diary-type novel, so I tried to steer clear of specific dates unless they served a particular purpose that would benefit the overall story. I did write myself a calendar of late 1777 to spring 1778 and used it to both document important events that happened in real life as well as plot points in my story. I also did my best to keep my characters as realistic as possible regarding their scope of knowledge, depending on their roles. I found this particularly important regarding the politics of the day. Think about those surveys that say the average American can only name 12 presidents (I don’t know if that’s an actual statistic, but you know the kind of thing I’m talking about). Sure, that might be a little sad and a reflection on our lack of attention to our own history, but it’s real! I imagine it’s not just Americans, either. How many British people can name all the Plantagenets? The point is, real humans have stuff going on in their lives today, and this was still true for people in history. Which brings me to pitfall number two:
Letting hindsight taint the story
Antonia Fraser, my favorite biographer, points out that “hindsight makes bad history.” I would add that it also makes wobbly historical fiction. It is very, very hard to remove our knowledge of the past and write stories about people living in that past who don’t know the outcome. The American Revolution was long. It’s only a few chapters in our high school history textbooks but it lasted years and spanned all of the colonies. And when you consider the shorter average lifespan people had during that time, it would have been the defining event for an entire generation. Those people had no clue how it would turn out. It’s natural to get swept up in the patriotism and significance of the war while writing about it, but to make the story believable I worked very hard to limit my characters’ perspectives as much as possible. This was a big reason I chose to write in first-person present. I think it adds to the urgency and “modernity” of the story.
And pitfall 3: Forgetting to have fun with it
There are some people who insist that historical fiction be as accurate/authentic/realistic as possible. To those people I say, that’s what documentaries and biographies are for. And I love both of those things! But I don’t want my novel to sound like a documentary. There’s a whole range of historical fiction, from Bridgerton to that John Adams HBO series that came out a while ago. Both have their pros and cons, and their own distinct audiences. My goal was to keep The Turncoat in Carrington Park somewhere in the middle, right in the plausible category. I tried to avoid as many anachronisms as I could, but my priority was the story and characters. Just think, a few hundred years from now people will be writing stories about the 21st century and sure, they’ll get loads of stuff wrong, but I highly doubt any of us will care.
If there’s a particular historical period that interests you, I highly recommend trying your hand at a little historical fiction. It’s a great exercise in character development, research, and restraint. I absolutely loved it and I look forward to polishing my skills!