Historical Fiction is one of my favorite genres to read. I love reading about various times in history and the people who are living there. I am especially keen when it is a time period that I do not know a lot about. I do not usually count historical romance in the same category, although that is one of the draws to that genre. This year to date, I have read 11 historical fiction novels.
To me, one of the interesting parts of this set of books is that six of them were from the 1900s. This is kind of unusual for me. I read WWI and WW2 books, but this year I read books from the 1910s through the 1950s. I was fascinated by reading about the Prohibition Era (1920) and the time of Comstock.(1910). I have read very little about the Dust Bowl time (1930) specifically in Colorado. I found the people, the clothing, the available choices made fascinating. I guess we can say the whats and whys.
Three of the books were written with multiple voices in different times. One of the time differences came from Women of the Dunes (800s, 1800s, and 2000s). I was particularly fascinated by the 800s even though those chapters were the shortest. The other book written during ancient times (1460BC and the early 1900s AD) was Daughter of Egypt. I was fascinated by Hapshetut and her life. The most unusual of the multiple books was Keeper of the Lost Children, which covered the 1940, 1950, and 1960. It was interesting how even within a 10 year time period how much changed and didn’t change.
The outliers were from the 1680s (Witch of Blackburn Pond) and 1860s (News of the World). Both were interesting because of the times and the characters. It will be interesting to compare The Witch of Blackburn Pond and the First Witch of Boston (on my to-be-read list).
I did discover that I wouldn’t do well in the past. I really like indoor plumbing with hot and cold water. I also am a fan of heated buildings.
Elise has sent in a book review called The Method by Matthew Quirk. The novel seems to be a character study and a spy novel rolled together. She sent in an interview with Sarah Sundin and her new book Mists over Channel Islands. I found this quite interesting as most people do not realize that the Channel Islands were occupied by the Germans in WW2.
I wish you a week of good reading!
