Ah as fiction readers and writers we
all dream of far off exotic lands, interesting places and scenarios
to explore, and fascinating people who live more exciting lives than
we do (I am not sure but I don't think I ever read about James Bond
sitting in his PJ's eating pizza at his computer, er.. not that I
ever do...). Some even dream of far away times, whether as a science
fiction writer one thinks of the future, or one thinks of past times.
I know my wife loves reading about the middle ages. Me, I prefer the
late 19th and early 20th centuries. Whatever
time period, past, present or future, is your favorite or preference,
you find many stories written about each period.
Of
the three time periods, writing historical fiction is probably the
hardest . For present day issues you can just write about the world
around you. For futuristic science fiction and fantasy, well you make
up the world and its rules. But when writing about the past, one has
to be very careful and make sure you do your research.
Some
questions you need to answer are:
- What and how did people eat back in your period?
- What did they wear?
- How did they get their goods?
- How long does it take to travel 5, 10, 100 miles?
- What were the social customs?
- What were the trends of the day?
- What were the major news stories of the day?
- What kind of houses, how did they heat them and how many to a room?
- What were the houses made of?
- And so on and so forth.
You
see you have to be careful not to imbue your characters with modern
day values or thoughts. True most of human nature hasn't changed over
the last few million years, but our attitudes and how we believed the
world to be was different even 25 years ago compared to today (Inter
what? World Wide What?, yes I remember time before the internet PC's
and GUIs, how did we ever survive back then?). People who read
historical fiction know about and are interested in the period you
will be writing about. And they tend to be very knowledgeable and if
you try and pull a fast one, well they will suss you out and throw
your book away, very fast. So do your research.
Be
very careful when writing abut historical figures as well. You can't
be making up new stories about them as you might end up being sued
for libel (yes it seems even the dead have rights these days) by
their heirs or historical societies. The best thing to do is create
your own character who might have known the person, or served with
them etc. They can have some interaction with the historical
character, but no new made up deep dark secrets should be invented.
Events can be used, but again be sure to stick to the facts, just
stretch the behind the scenes, you just add thoughts of your
character who was there, but not necessarily a major player in the
history books.
What
genre works with historical fiction? Well just about any if you
really think about it. You can have a detective investigating the
Boston Tea Party, or maybe a romance aboard the Lusitania, or maybe
an adventure with the Crusaders, or a student of Leonardo Da Vinci's.
Maybe even write a story, and go back and change a few tidbits here
and there, and all of a sudden you are in the 18th Century court of
the Czar of Russia! The ideas are endless, and only hampered by your
imagination. Just get your facts right and you can do anything.
All
in all writing historical fiction is a fun escape to a bygone era,
one where you can wonder what it was like to be in a simpler time.
Get it right and you can find unbridled success. Just be sure to take
care and do your research or the readers will skewer your work.
Mahalo.
Come
back next time for more tips, tricks and techniques to assist you in
your writing,marketing and sales efforts. Remember we're all in this
together and I'm pulling for you.
Mahalo.
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