When using real people in historical fiction, how far must you be true to them? Or, rather, how wildly may you traduce them? William Sutton ponders a common concern for writers. Do you worry about misrepresenting historical figures? “You faithless writer,” cry my characters, as I attribute to them words and attitudes they would renounce. […]
Dr. Darwin’s Writing Tips
Historian? Novelist? Reader? Who should I go to for feedback? Our resident agony aunt tackles a common question for writers of historical fiction. Dear Dr Darwin I’ve got to the stage where I want feedback on my novel-in-progress, but I only know non-historical novelists, or non-novelist historians, or readers of historical fiction who don’t write […]
Back to the Past
Our guest this month, award-winning author Ally Sherrick, on the complexities of writing historical fiction for a young audience. I’ve been a time-traveller for as long as I can remember. If you set the dial for my own past, you’d find me weaving in and out of ancient stone circles, clambering up the towers of […]
Zounds! Whatevs! How can I find the right voice for my novel?
Dear Dr Darwin My characters don’t think they sound historical, but their present-day isn’t my present-day: they are Other to us. If I make them sound like 21st century people then the novel will just be like a modern film in pretty period costumes, but if I try to write the novel as it would […]
I know what story I want to tell; how do I tell it?
Dear Dr Darwin, I’ve found a gripping set of historical events that I want to build a novel round, and before you start shaking your Tudor bonnet, it’s not because I have a non-fiction agenda: this is a glorious concatenation of politics, faith, personalities, clothes, weapons and all the other things that make historical fiction […]
The need to fact-check is strangling my creative mind!
Dear Dr Darwin, I know we have to get the facts right, or risk the reader not buying into their side of the contract of fiction, but I do get so fed up with having to fact-check the whole time. When I sit down to write, I have stacks of books and files of images, […]