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 This week, I posted a review of Shadow of the Swords, a book that I enjoyed but found too many historical accuracies in to be entirely comfortable with. I loved the idea of it, but worried that the doubts the changes would leave in readers’ minds would undermine the otherwise important story the author was trying to convey. The author, Kamran Pasha, dropped by, and left his opinion on my review; namely that fiction is an art and is still enjoyable despite changes made to history, that it’s more than a dry retelling of facts. You can read his comment in full here. I’ve really appreciated the fact that he left a comment because it led us to an interesting email discussion, which has given me the idea for this post and the desire to find out whether others agree or disagree.
In essence, my opinion of historical fiction when it involves mainly real characters and events is this; that it should follow historical fact as much as we know and use the author’s imagination to in effect fill in the blanks. I do think that sometimes minor changes are necessary, and fictional characters inserted into said history don’t bother me particularly, but I really dislike the changes of major events, the omission of important historical characters, and in general anything that could give a reader the wrong impression about the period, the event, or the person.
Undoubtedly a book can be a wonderful read even if it gets history wrong, but I know some people do read historical fiction and allow it to influence their beliefs and feelings about the historical period in question. Yes, this includes me, although I do try to read history about any period that I am really enjoying in fiction, to make up my own mind. I love that historical fiction has really taken off in the past few years, but I am often running into people who believe they know something but they’ve been misled by a book or a movie. Historians do get it wrong and historical understanding can change over time, which is why it’s important to read a few different sources in order to escape bias, but so few people do that and I dislike the fact that they could easily pick up and spread a mistaken belief because of a fiction book they read.
Even major politicians get history wrong and many people seem to have lost the ability to think for themselves; that probably doesn’t apply to anyone reading this blog, but I firmly believe we should get it right whenever we possibly can. Think about all the backlash against immigrants; how many Americans are from immigrant stock themselves? All of us who aren’t Native Americans, if you think about it. As an example, how many of us are proud to be Irish now, and how many of those have neatly forgotten the discrimination our grandparents endured and insist on perpetuating it by discriminating against others? This is why history is important, because it does profoundly affect what is happening today and can help us to determine how we react to the calamities of the future.
Finally, I also think a lot of my desire for history to be as accurate as possible in historical fiction is simply because I love history. I think it’s all fascinating on its own. I love historical fiction because it can bring that history to life, and I will admit that I feel misled and cheated if I believed what I read and the author had in fact changed things to suit his or her story without saying a word about it anywhere. In the book I first referenced in this post, Shadow of the Swords, Pasha does freely admit that he changed things in his author’s note, and in general if changes are necessary I like when they’re detailed somewhere. I still probably won’t agree with what was changed, but at least I know what to believe and what not to believe and I can respect the author’s desire to construct his or her own version of the story.
Perhaps I’m thinking too deeply about historical fiction, but I do believe an understanding of history is important in becoming an informed citizen of the world. Many of us do feel we’re learning from historical fiction; it’s not just mindless pleasure that is immediately forgotten. Fiction can be a powerful tool to inspire us to learn more, to understand the world that much better, to become better people. As a result I do feel we should get it as close to the truth as we can; the wonderful stories are there. They just need a clever mind to give them life and make them accessible to those who prefer not to read straight non-fiction. Obviously, much of my own personal preference as represented in this post is due to the fact that I think everyone should have some basic understanding of history. My own studies have massively expanded and drastically changed my own view of the world in ways that I appreciate on a regular basis; I wish that for everyone else, too, and I think historical fiction could be an important first step.
What do you think? Do you agree or disagree? Am I missing the point of fiction? How much history do you like in your historical fiction?
I am behind on almost everything these days (except my work, which my boss will probably be happy to hear) but I’m determined not to be this week! That’s because it’s Book Blogger Appreciation Week, and even though I have probably about 10 reviews to write, they’re all going on the backburner for this week’s awesome festivities. I really want to visit new blogs and comment on far more posts than I have been lately, so let’s hope I can actually achieve that goal. I certainly haven’t been achieving it recently.
In other news, my Kindle 3 arrived last week. I wasn’t sure whether to do an official review of it or not, since so many people are anti-Amazon, but it really is a fantastic little device. It was the obvious choice for me but even so I’m actually surprised by how pleased I am with it. Reading on it is ridiculously easy and I’m pretty sure I’m consuming books as fast as ever. I’ve read 4 on there and I’ve only had it for a week and a half; I’ve read a number of real books in that time, too. I love that it makes buying new more affordable for me, so I can support publishers and authors more than I did before. They get less money for ebooks, but I’m sure it’s more than when I buy books from charity shops. I’m definitely keeping to my aim of using it for books I don’t think I’d want to keep, and still buying in hard copy those that I think I’ll be rereading and want to have on my shelves for the rest of my life. I did end up finding a local used bookstore, so I’ve been haunting there as well; far from replacing my need for paper books, my Kindle has just supplemented it, and I feel like I can spread my money more equally.
As much as I like it, though, my husband likes it even more. He said just yesterday that Apple is always busy talking about their magical devices, but Amazon has created a device that is *actually* magical. I’m sure part of his excitement is the fact that there will be fewer books lying around, but based on my purchasing even with it, that benefit is probably not as great as he thinks! He claims to find holding paper books awkward, but has no problem with the Kindle, especially as holding it and clicking the button to turn pages is so natural.
That’s about it for me; I’d better get catching up on some reviews before my online book club starts. I’m very much looking forward to this coming week and I hope you are too!
Since I’m still recovering from the emotional impact of Mockingjay (you’ll be able to read my spoiler-filled review tomorrow), I decided it was high time for my first Sunday Salon post in the past few weeks. I’ve been spectacularly bad at writing more thoughtful posts these days, even when I have ideas for them, mainly because I’m so behind on reviews that whenever I feel like writing I just start in on those. But tomorrow is a bank holiday, so I won’t be at work, and will probably have time to actually catch up on both reviews and reading blogs, if I’m lucky.
We have been meaning to go camping for the past few weekends, but still haven’t managed to get ourselves out there and do it. Either it threatens to rain or the campsites are too full or we find some other chores we really should do around the house. We’ve still been busy, though. We joined English Heritage last weekend and have been to visit a couple of awesome places.
Last weekend we went to Scarborough Castle, situated ridiculously high above the seaside town of Scarborough. The beach was packed, but the castle wasn’t, so we had plenty of space to poke around. Like many English castles, it’s a ruin and was bombed in the Civil War to prevent its use as defense. They still managed to use it in World War I, though.
We also stumbled on Anne Bronte’s grave. I’d had no idea she was even buried in Scarborough; she even had some flowers. The tombstone was very weathered and it’s clear someone replaced the lettering to make it readable again. I’m glad she’s been so well remembered.
Just yesterday we went to Brodsworth Hall and Gardens. Unusually the house has been left mainly as it was found when it was given to English Heritage in 1990. It hadn’t been lived in for a number of years and the house as it stands is a charming mish-mash of different periods from its Victorian construction in the 1860’s to its final occupation in the mid 20th century. Some of the house is formally laid out, like in the huge dining hall, and its mock Italian design is still just as beautiful as it was originally, but the wallpaper is peeling in half the house, the billiards table has had its color leached half away, and things are left mostly in disarray in the bedrooms and dining rooms. Even the bathrooms were half modern and half chamber pots. It gave me a surprisingly good idea about what it would be like if people actually lived there; in many cases it looked like they’d just stepped away for a minute or two. Unfortunately pictures aren’t allowed inside, mostly because so much of the house is deteriorating, but the outside is still quite lovely.
I’m doing okay as far as reading is concerned, too. I’ve read quite a few books this month and I’m managing to read roughly 1/3 of each type of book I have around. Right now I’m about to start Bombay Time by Thrity Umrigar, which should be a welcome change from YA dystopia. What will you be reading today?
When I was a kid, I didn’t have a TBR pile. I’m not very old, but back then there wasn’t anything close to the river of books I’m swimming in these days. We didn’t have the internet and when we did, it was painfully slow dial-up. We didn’t know about buying books online. I hardly ever saw the inside of an actual bookstore; full-price books were too expensive. I dreamed of the day I could walk into Barnes and Noble and buy whatever I wanted. If I did get a book, it usually came from KMart or, best of all, the school book order.
Most of the books I read from school age until middle school were from the book order. I can still remember the excitement of looking through this folded-over paper which contained the books I would be reading for the next couple of months. Even better was the day they arrived and a lovely stack of TBR books was mine. They never lasted long; I bombed through books as a kid and almost everything I owned was read over and over again, even if I didn’t like it very much.
 My first forays into the world of adult books were romance novels, starting with Joining by Johanna Lindsey. This was about when Wal-Mart showed up in my town and they had these types of books for $3.50. This price was acceptable to my parents, and so I began to slowly amass a collection of romances. A TBR pile followed, but it was so tiny I kept it next to my pillow on my bed. I usually had about five books to choose from, and I was still rereading books from my younger days.
Then I hit high school and discovered fantasy novels. I’m not sure what else happened, but my TBR pile actually started to grow. Either my parents started buying me more books or I started asking for them for Christmas and birthdays to the exclusion of everything else. The TBR pile moved from on my bed to the floor next to it and I remember gleefully organizing the books in the order that I planned to read them. I distinctly remembering moving Winter’s Heart by Robert Jordan to the top of the pile because I just couldn’t wait to continue his series. I  stopped rereading books so much because I had more of them and I no longer needed to; they were also of the epic fantasy variety and rereading started taking a long time.
When I went to college, I took some of my TBR pile with me, along with old favorites. The pile slowly grew as I acquired books for various reasons. The biggest catalyst was discovering LibraryThing in late 2006, when I realized there were lots of people who loved books just as much as I did, and my awareness of books exploded. Then, in 2007, I started reviewing books here, and really got into it in 2008 when I graduated. We also discovered a used bookstore near my parents’ house where books cost a maximum of $2 and all the money goes to a hospital nearby. This bookstore is responsible for more than half of my present unread book pile of 440 books.
Now I have a shelf full of TBRs here, an immediate TBR pile, and a TBR mountain range left on the floor of my parents’ house. At this point I’m not sure I could ever go back to having a selection of 5 new books, although I would love to stop and reread some older books. I love having choices and knowing that quite a few of the books I want to read are already mine whenever I want to read them. There are always more books to be bought, though, and I’m not sure my TBR pile will ever shrink too far.
What’s the history of your TBR pile?
Today I had planned to post about my new deliberate reading strategy, which is basically just a return of my TBR – review – library book rotation, but it already isn’t working out so well for me. I like piling the books up in the order that I should read them, but the minute I land on a dud or feel like I’m not really happy with what I’ve chosen, I start to question what I’m doing. For example, right now I’m trying to get through The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, perfect timing since it just got longlisted for the Booker prize, but I’ll confess, I’m not crazy about it. I don’t really know why, but I just don’t think I’m a fan of David Mitchell’s prose and I’m not really seeing where the story is going – so I’m already impatient with it and worried that a few books are going to slow down my reading. My goal was to slow down my reading, but this isn’t working as well in practice as I had hoped. I’ll have to go back to the drawing board, I think.
Anyway, what I want to talk about now is ebooks. I’ve had a bit of a perfect storm this week leading up to the fact that I am considering getting an ebook reader. First off, the new Kindle 3 is actually in my price range. It’s also going to have a dedicated UK ebook store, the lack of which has put me off other devices in the past. Secondly, we are finally putting our anniversary trip to Paris (I can’t tell you how excited I am) in motion for October and I’m going to be on trains for about four hours each way, but don’t really want the weight of multiple books on my back while wandering around the city. And, to top it off, I ended up reading an ebook on my computer yesterday and today and I really dislike that experience. I also know that I could access at least some of the galleys on netgalley if I had a Kindle (unless a UK Kindle will struggle with this – a question I must ask!) and there are a number of exciting books there I’d love to read on release.
I don’t actually plan on buying too many ebooks full price for the device, but that option would be nice too. My husband is fully in support of the plan because he hates the huge number of unread books I have stacked around. I don’t want to give up paper books, though, and I always feel like I don’t really own the books I have in ebook format, especially knowing about DRM restrictions. Amazon isn’t very good about this, so even though we might end up with access to Kindle for Android on both of our mobiles in a year or two, I’m still hesitating. A couple of years ago I would never even have considered purchasing a Kindle, and I’m not even sure when I changed my mind about that!
So, what do you think? Is an ebook reader a good idea? Do you have one and enjoy using it? Help!
I have been a very bad blogger for the past two weeks. After I wrote all my catch-up reviews last Monday the 12th, I didn’t write a post and hardly even looked at my blog until just this morning. I have been at my parents’ house, and since I hadn’t seen them in nearly six months, I thought it was worth ignoring blogging for a bit. I did go around and leave a few comments, but what I really needed was a break from writing. I know writing is an art that gets better with practice, but after constantly writing every day for four months, I think I was getting enough practice and just needed a rest!
Luckily, I’ve returned with what I think may be an increased zest for blogging, and even if that only shows up with timely reviews, I hope I can stick to it a little more firmly than I have the past few months. So I hope I’m back, with more effort to put in than I had before!
Keith and I had a fantastic trip to the States. Once we got there (I hate flying, so that part was not so great!) we settled in for nearly two weeks of unhealthy food, time spent with parents and relatives, and tourism in my former corner of the world. We went to New York City or close to it three times and had the opportunity to go up the Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty, and tour Ellis Island. We had walks around Times Square and Central Park and didn’t spend nearly enough time in the American Museum of Natural History. We also paid that all-important visit to The Strand, even though it involved walking almost 70 blocks downtown in 90+ degree heat. It was definitely not a cheap trip, but we wanted to treat it like a proper holiday.
I read, too, mostly making an effort to get through a few of the review copies that had accumulated there for the past few months. I finished off:
   
  
I enjoyed all of them to varying degrees and I plan on reviewing them over this week and next week. I’m also thinking about my reading plan going forward; I brought back a load of books with me and I really need to prioritize! In the meantime, though, I’m reading The Magicians and Mrs Quent, an absolutely charming fantasy book that I can’t wait to tell you about.
How have you all been the past two weeks? Have I missed anything exciting on your blog?
This Sunday finds me in full relaxation mode, with a little bit of World Cup excitement mixed in. Normally, I’m not really a sports fan; in fact, I think it’s almost silly how worked up people get whether their favorite team wins or loses. In this country, it’s to the extent that it reaches violence – and all because someone didn’t kick a ball into a net? Team spirit is fine; violence isn’t so much. I’ve never understood that.
What I do understand, however, is money, and as it happens we’ve had a sweepstakes at work and I drew Spain. Since money is now riding on it, I’ve become a fan, and as such I’m really looking forward to the game later; even if they don’t win, it’s been exciting watching them get so close, and there is no negative feeling about the World Cup because England’s not in it anymore. I think it’s going to be a good evening.
While I’m waiting for this evening, I’ve already been reading. I’m not really an early morning type of person, but my body clock is and has always been extremely persistent, so every weekend I find I’m up and about around my normal work wake-up time, no matter how much I would prefer to stay in bed a little bit longer. I’ve put the time to good use this morning at least by finishing The Boy Who Loved Books by John Sutherland, a memoir about a boy whose father died in war training when he was very young, and who found refuge in books and booze (later becoming an English professor mostly by a stroke of luck). I’m now looking forward to starting Brooklyn by Colm Toibin, which has patiently been waiting on my bookshelf for a few months. I have tomorrow off, so I anticipate finishing it before I leave on Tuesday to visit my parents.
Before I go, though, I also have six reviews to write, packing and cleaning to do, and purchases to make. I’m not sure how much I’ll be reading this time; I’ll have Keith with me, for one thing, so I’ll probably be doing a lot less reading of review copies. Since I also have less of them, that’s probably okay – but I don’t know how much I’ll be blogging either. I’ll just see how it goes. I do hope to read The Passage by Justin Cronin on the plane. I’m hoping it’s exciting enough to take my mind off the fact that I’m in the air!
Do you have any exciting plans for the day? Will you be watching the World Cup final?
First of all, Happy Fourth of July to all Americans reading this blog! I hope you’re outside celebrating and watching fireworks later on.
This year, I resolved to read more deliberately. By that, I mean reading what I want to, when I want to, without worrying too much about books I “should” be reading. It’s about getting to those books I’ve meant to read for years. I’ve radically cut down on the number of review copies I accept – my parents have actually asked me why I’m suddenly not getting many books at home – and I’ve chosen only the ones that I would purchase if I saw them in the store.
I also decided to try and buy fewer books, but that isn’t happening and is a goal I’ve basically given up on. I have been buying at least a few every month and it’s an addiction I’ve more or less decided to allow myself. I don’t really buy anything else and now that I have a second shelf, I have a little room for them.
Now that it’s July, I thought it would be a pretty good idea to see how I’m doing with my goals overall. I have definitely been making more conscious choices. The last book I read, The Bonesetter’s Daughter by Amy Tan, was one I’d had since 2008 and wanted to read pretty much the whole time, so I was happy to clear that off, especially since it didn’t quite live up to expectations. And I’ve just started Under Heaven by Guy Gavriel Kay. He’s one of my favorite authors and I was determined not to let his newest book languish underneath shorter, more convenient books.
Unfortunately, though, I can’t really say that I’ve done so well throughout the first six months of the year. I’m still regularly choosing books that are shorter and easier because I know I’ll get them read faster, especially now that it takes me a day longer to read everything than I was used to. I still get frustrated if I haven’t finished a book fast enough. And even with my vastly reduced intake of review copies, I’ve managed to read more of them than I have of my own books. While it’s good that I’m clearing out some backlog I’ve had for far too long, I would rather the balance tipped the other way in future. Library books are a distant third; I love the library and free books that carry no obligations, but I find I’d rather clear a book off my TBR pile than devote a few days to a library book. I’d also like to change this.
So what’s my plan, going forward? I don’t know yet. I’ve considered resurrecting my schedule of a TBR book, a library book, and a review book. I like having a concrete stack of what’s ahead, but I’m worried I’ll rebel against myself, something I’ve done way too often in the past. I’ve considered trying to challenge myself to read all the books I’ve acquired in 2010 by the end of the year, which should actually be an easy accomplishment if I don’t buy any more, but we all know that isn’t going to happen.
Since I’m going to visit my parents for a couple of weeks this month, I’ve decided to leave it open for now and do as I please. In August, I’ll try to come up with a plan for choosing my reading more carefully, without automatically selecting a short book over a long one. But in the meantime, I’d like to ask you an important question: how do you choose what to read next?
Since I just finished Don’t Tempt Me by Loretta Chase, which was quite disappointing, I thought this was the ideal time for a Sunday Salon post. I haven’t had much time on the weekends; we’ve been busy readying up our old flat for sale or rent (we still haven’t decided yet) and since it’s a six hour round trip, sitting in the car has taken up a lot of my weekends by itself!
All the traveling has given us a good chance to see a few of the sights along the way, though. Last weekend, we finally went to visit Bosworth Field, which is where the Battle of Bosworth happened and the Wars of the Roses ended. I have always wanted to go there and I was particularly excited now that they’ve officially found the battlefield. Unfortunately, the battlefield is actually on a private farm and ordinary visitors aren’t allowed. Instead, there’s a visitor’s centre which talks about the time period, the battle, and its aftermath, with some archaeological artifacts at the end. To make the disappointment worse, half of the artifacts, including ALL of the cannonballs and gunshot, were gone for research. I’m all in support of research, but did they really have to take all of it? There wasn’t even anything to take a picture of.
We also recently went to Hardwick Hall, which was a vastly more interesting place. It’s one of the estates built by Bess of Hardwick and it was truly an amazing place; we had less than an hour there and we definitely plan to go back, especially since I didn’t have my camera. I’ve now acquired Bess of Hardwick from the library; once I’ve read that, we’ll also go to Chatsworth. Having historical background in mind always makes visiting historic places even better, don’t you think?
I plan to spend the rest of the day catching up on reviews; I’m working overtime two days this week so I doubt I will have much energy for blogging the other three! In two weeks, though, we’ll be off visiting my parents in the United States, so I’m looking forward to the break. After that, I’ll probably begin reading The Russian Dreambook of Color and Flight, and I also need to read Skeletons at the Feast this week for next weekend’s book club. That might just be it, though!
What are you planning to read this week?
So, after all my excitement and progress on Friday, my fervor for bloggy improvements more or less died out on Saturday and continued dying today. I just didn’t want to spend the entire weekend on the computer. I’ve written most of my outstanding reviews, but that’s about all I got done, so I’ve only spent about five hours total on my blog. But the big event did give me the impetus I needed to make the important change of moving my blog over to its new domain and fixing all the links, which was what I really needed to achieve anyway. Thanks to Natasha at Maw Books Blog for hosting the event!
I appear to have focused on reading instead of blogging; I did manage to finish The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson, Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater, and Magic Bleeds by Ilona Andrews. I’m about to start The Confessions of Catherine de Medici by C.W. Gortner and I’m really looking forward to it. I doubt I’ll read the whole thing today, but I definitely want to have a couple of hours with it this evening. I also got a few things done around the house and we watched the USA vs England game. I’m not really into the World Cup – or soccer – too much, but we figured since one of us was American and the other British that we should put forth effort. Typically, it was a draw, probably disappointing people in both countries, but at least in my house we’re still even.
We’ve also given up the battle against the TBR around here. Last week I purchased my very own TBR bookcase which, unsurprisingly, is already full. Keith likes to think that I won’t buy new books until there’s space for them on there, but I think we all know what’s going to happen. I can finally see all of my books since for the first time they’re not shelved double. I officially have about 150 books here that are unread, which leaves a very scary number still at my parents’ house in the US. I’ll be getting at least a few of those back here in July and it’ll be interesting to see just how many we can squeeze on there. I’ll show off the bookcase in my next library loot post, coming probably on Tuesday! I finally managed to read a few library books so I can head back there again tomorrow.
That’s all for me this week; I have a more contemplative Sunday Salon planned but I think I’ll save that one for next week. I hope some good reads are ahead for you this week!
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