Chuyển đến nội dung chính

A Long Petal of the Sea, Isabel Allende's epic of the Spanish Civil War and its aftermath

Allende’s fluidly written saga conveys her deep familiarity with the events she depicts, and her intent to illustrate their human impact in a moving way. The scope spans most of the lives of Victor Dalmau, a Republican army medic in 1936 Spain, and Roser Bruguera, a music student taken in by Victor’s family and, later, his brother Guillem’s lover and the mother of Guillem’s child. The story follows them over nearly sixty years, beginning with the tumult of the Spanish Civil War. Guillem is killed fighting against the Fascists, news that Victor can’t bear to tell Roser initially. After surviving separate and terrible circumstances that leave them refugees in France, where authorities treat them with contempt and worse, the two marry for practical reasons in order to join Pablo Neruda’s mission transporting over 2000 Spanish exiles to Chile aboard the S.S. Winnipeg . In Santiago, the Dalmaus find many Chileans sympathetic to the Spaniards, while others make them unwelcome. With a poetic ...
Đăng nhận xét

The Secret

The Secret

Bits and pieces of historical fiction news: African epics, the writing biz, Australian HF, collaborative novels, and more

Rewriting the Historical Epic: African Women Writers Go Big.  The Christian Science Monitor profiles female writers from Africa taking on "big grand historical narratives" in their fiction, including Petina Gappah (Out of Darkness, Shining Light), Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi (Kintu), and Ayesha Harruna Attah (The Hundred Wells of Salaga). All have received considerable acclaim. Namwali Serpell's The Old Drift is another, though it's not mentioned in the article.

I appreciate reading historical novelists' takes on the business aspects of authorship. At her blog, Susanne Dunlap, who has written for both  adults and YAs, and whose latest novels are indie-published, talks about her past and current writing career: the monetary aspects, marketing, and finding a support network.

And Michelle Cameron, author of The Fruit of Her Hands, a fantastic read focusing on medieval Jewish history, and the forthcoming Beyond the Ghetto Gates, writes about the process of asking for blurbs from other authors.

Joffe Books recently got in touch to say they'd purchased the fiction list of long-running British publisher Robert Hale, and that they plan to work with authors to re-release their books on Kindle with new covers and editorial refreshes. I'm a longtime collector of novels from Robert Hale, which published many novels about British and European royals in decades past; they also published historical romances and sagas. Because Hale's hardcovers were aimed at libraries, many have been expensive and/or hard to find on the secondhand market. Anyone interested in getting updates can sign up for Joffe's email list.

Leading up to the Historical Novel Society Australasia's latest conference, which is this coming weekend, the Sydney Morning Herald has a focus on fiction set in the past.  Read more: Turning Pages: the mirror of history.

Lastly, what's it like to write a collaborative novel, one smoothly stitched together from seven different viewpoints? The six authors of Ribbons of Scarlet: A Novel of the French Revolution's Women are interviewed at BookBub.




Nhận xét

Đăng nhận xét

Bài đăng phổ biến từ blog này

The Almanack by Martine Bailey, a richly atmospheric mystery of mid-18th-century England

Saturated with beautiful images of the natural world in mid-18th century rural England, Bailey’s third mystery evokes a time when people regulated their lives according to the change of seasons and were fascinated by mechanisms, scientific and not, used to predict future events. It takes place during a pivotal period rarely seen in fiction: the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in 1752, when eleven days were “lost.” A young woman named Tabitha Hart is robbed by her latest bedmate while traveling from London to her home village of Netherlea at her ailing mother’s request. Alas, she arrives too late: the Widow Hart lies cold in her bed, presumably having drowned in the river. Although she is shamed for her loose behavior, and for leaving behind an infant girl for her mother to raise, Tabitha is well-educated, and she takes up her mother’s former post as village searcher. She also picks up her mother’s favorite Almanack, and the scribbled marginalia in the little book, along with a threa...
Đăng nhận xét
Đọc thêm

The Satapur Moonstone by Sujata Massey, a mystery set in 1920s India

Perveen Mistry’s position as the only female lawyer in 1921 Bombay keeps her services in demand. When Sir David Hobson-Jones, the governor’s chief councillor, asks her to investigate a legal matter for the Kolhapur Agency, a British civil service branch, she’s wary of getting into bed with India’s colonizers. It’s a lucrative, prestigious short-term opportunity, however, and she feels compelled to accept. The maharaja of the small princely state of Satapur is a ten-year-old boy, and his widowed mother and grandmother disagree on his education. Because they live in purdah, a woman lawyer is the best choice as mediator. While this premise is similar to the series opener, The Widows of Malabar Hill , Perveen quickly finds herself in a very different situation that tests her physical strength and negotiating skills and lands her into danger. Massey devotes ample time to illustrating the politics and culture of a remote Indian princely state and the personalities of a new cast before introd...
Đăng nhận xét
Đọc thêm

The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes, a novel about books, dedication, and female friendship during the Depression years

Books provide people with education and entertainment; they change lives as they introduce different worlds and unfamiliar experiences. During the Depression, the women who transported books in their horses’ saddlebags to isolated Kentucky mountain residents, in all seasons, as part of the WPA’s Pack Horse Library Initiative provided a lifeline of literacy to their audiences. Hearing about this unique job after a dull church service, Alice Van Cleve grows intrigued and immediately volunteers to join. After getting swept off her feet by Bennett Van Cleve, a burly, handsome Kentuckian visiting her native England, Alice feels stifled by the insularity in her new home of Baileyville, a small Appalachian town, and surprised by her new husband’s unexpected aloofness. Alice had never fit in at home, and with her clipped British accent and dislike for frivolous social pursuits, she’s an outsider in Kentucky, too. She finds an unofficial new family with the four other pack-horse librarians, inc...
Đăng nhận xét
Đọc thêm

Free $100

Free $100