Heather wrote in with a great question about life after Harry Potter:Recently I have devoured the series of books by Philip Pullman called “His Dark Materials” (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass). While the shelf at the bookstore I found them in was young adult and science fiction/fantasy, I felt they went far beyond the scope of what a young person would appreciate. Much like the fascination with the Harry Potter series by both young and older, but far more compelling in my opinion. Can you recommend any other authors/books similar to Pullman other than the more familiar Tolkien and Lewis?Harry Potter, as everyone knows, has dominated the world of young adult and fantasy fiction of late. J. K. Rowling’s greatest asset is her boundless imagination, but she can be lacking in her mastery of language and form. So what else is there? As you suggest, Philip Pullman has emerged with an incredible series of books (which I, too, devoured about a year ago). They exceed Harry Potter in nearly every sense, and Pullman manages to strike the perfect balance, appealing to children (and clearly adults, as well) with thrilling adventures, characters, and a seamless world, while never ever dumbing down for his young readers. It’s really a great series, one of the highlights in books from the last few years, if you ask me. But you already know this. My other favorite children’s fantasy series is Brian Jacques’ Redwall series. The world he creates has a medival, Tolkeinesque feel to it, though instead of knights and princesses or hobbits and orcs, this world is populated by tribes of animals, mice and ferrets and stoats and many others. I started reading these when I was very young and I made my way through at least six or seven, so I can vouch that these are great books. The series begins with Redwall, Mossflower, and Mattimeo with many beyond those. Having said that, I don’t think that anything out there is as good as C. S. Lewis’ “Narnia” series or J. R. R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” series. They are the masters that preside over the genre. Another thought: try revisiting (or making your acquaintance with) some classic books. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne or The Time Machine and The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells. Great books one and all. Anybody else have thoughts on though this one. Hit the comment link below and let us know.Mucho Mutis!!!My buddy Brian who is a fellow follower of the travels of Maqroll the Gaviero notified me of two recent developments concerning the head Maqroll-watcher himself, Alvaro Mutis. First, and most exciting, it appears as though a new book by Mutis will appear in English for the first time ever this fall. It’s called The Mansion & Other Stories, and it will be released by the Canadian publisher Ekstasis Editions. I have so many questions: will there be stories about Maqroll, will this edition be well-translated, will the stories bear any resemblence to the novellas that I know and love? I can’t wait to find out. So far all I know is this. In the early 1970s, Mutis got into an argument with his friend, the director Luis Bunuel. Bunuel felt that a “gothic” story could not be set in the tropics because that sort of story required the ambient chill of higher latitudes. Mutis strenuously disagreed, and in order to prove him wrong penned the story, The Mansion of Araucaima, the title story of this collection. Bunuel loved the story and expressed his desire to make it into a film, but he died before he was able to carry it out. My friend Brian also alerted me to the fact that the current issue of World Literature Today is devoted to Mutis. If you’re interested, you can find on the site: ten poems by Mutis, Mutis on Mutis, and several more academic papers on this fantastic writer.The Return of PolidoriThe Robert Polidori book that I mentioned a few days ago has hit bookstores. It’s called Zones of Exclusion: Pripyat and Chernobyl. Polidori is one of the most skilled and sought after architectural photographers in the world, and in this capacity he is often called upon to capture the sleek and the new. But anyone who has seen his book Havana knows that architectural decay is his true calling. At Chernobyl and in Pripyat he presents the shattered world of nuclear disaster, both frozen in time and abandoned to a new and dangerous mutant form of nature. As always, he lets color do all the work in these photographs, seemingly luring the most poignant hues to the foreground of the compositions. But I have to say, this collection, due to the nature of the subject matter, exudes a cold and souless sort of beauty while the aching, crumbling beauty of Havana is more suited to his particular skills.A note of things to comeI finished Jonathan Lethem’s new novel The Fortress of Solitude, a week or so ago, and I intend to put some more elaborate comments on the book up here once it comes out, but I will make few comments now, too. Look for this book to be huge this fall. There will be a big push from Random House, and along the book distribution pipeline, big numbers are being anticipated. The book is very good in the same way that The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon is very good. The books are similar in structure and theme, both are very ambitious and largely succeed in their grand scope. Pehaps most interestingly, the careers of Chabon and Lethem are parallel. Lethem has several books under his belt each more widely read and more favorably recieved than the last, and now this latest book will be a best-seller and will make him more of a household name. The same thing happened to Chabon. Finally, I’m going to go out on a limb here and predict that The Fortress of Solitude will win the Pulitzer Prize, (or at the very least will be a finalist) like Kavalier & Clay did a few years back.
According to Wikipedia, not the definitive source in this realm but a decent enough place to start, a work of historical fiction can be defined as one in which “the story is set among historical events, or more generally, in which the time of the action predates the lifetime of the author.” This is a bit broad for my taste, but I think it’s a good place to start. Going by this definition, a lot of books that we think of first as fiction could also qualify as historical fiction. Some of my favorite books by contemporary authors fall into this category. T.C. Boyle’s Water Music is about a Scottish explorer in Africa in the late 18th century, and Edward P. Jones’ book The Known World is about black slave owners in Virginia in the 1840s. Another example of a book like these is Charles Frazier’s Civil War novel, Cold Mountain.
But these books aren’t really historical fiction in the same way that I, Claudius is historical fiction. Traditionally, in historical fiction, the history is like another character in the novel, and the action is more likely to be ripped from the history books, as it were, placing the reader in a novelized version of true historical events. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell about Atlanta during the Civil War is a famous example. Another is James Clavell’s Shogun about the 16th century exploration of Asia. Of the few historical novels I’ve read, my favorite would have to be Leon Uris’ Trinity, a powerful epic about the Irish struggle for independence at the turn of the 20th century.
Well, the sequel Claudius the God is also a must-read. I have a sort of obsession with Graves, I have read "I, Claudius" countless times. There is really nothing else quite like it. Graves wrote a lot of other historical fiction, but a lot of it is quite peculiar, like "Wife to Mr. Milton" or "They Hanged My Sainted Billy." I like them, but they are a bit of an acquired taste.
Gore Vidal's "Julian" is in my opinion his best, though the nineteenth-century American ones are also appealing (esp. Lincoln and Burr); Rosemary Sutcliffe's young-adult Roman-and-British history novels are also very good (and actually, I think young-adult historical fiction is often more appealing than the adult stuff; I recommend E. L. Konigsberg's "A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver," about Eleanor of Aquitaine). Margaret Yourcenar's Hadrian is a classic but I don't know if it stands up as well as Graves from the standpoint of pure enjoyment. Mary Renault is really wonderful if you haven't read her, must check it out if not: "The Last of the Wine" is perhaps my favorite, but there's a really good one about Alexander the Great ("Fire From Heaven"), an excellent one based on the (mythic) Theseus ("The Bull From the Sea"), and "The Praise Singer" is another favorite of mine (it's years since I read them, I may have got some of the titles wrong).
Hilary Mantel's "A Place of Greater Safety" is an interesting (though to me ultimately not so satisfying) novel about the French Revolution, if you like novels that treat public political events. My best other recommendation is Sebastian Faulks; I think "Birdsong" and "Charlotte Grey" are both extremely satisfying novels, about WWI and WWII respectively. If WWII counts as historical, of course, there start to be lots of good books to read….
All right, that's enough! But there's a lot of great other stuff out there too, of course. War and Peace is in some sense the great historical novel, put that one on the list too if you haven't read it…
Stephen Harrigan's Gates of the Alamo is a moving piece of historical fiction, told by both the Texian and Mexican sides.
I would like to add a few suggestions to the list.
Madison Smartt Bell's Haitian trilogy, starting with All Soul's Rising and ending with The Stone That the Builder Refused, is historical fiction on an epic scale. It tells the story of the Haitian slave revolution. This is a great example, in my opinion, of what historical fiction does best.
Tom Franklin's Hell at the Breech recreates an unusual private war between wealthy landowners and poor sharecroppers that raged in the backwoods of Alabama in the 1890s. A well-done recreation of a sad and mostly forgotten incident in American history.
Elizabeth Gaffney's Metropolis recreated New York's Five Corners area – think Dickens redoing Gangs of New York. A good story, well told, with excellent period details.
mario varga llosa. Feast of the Goat. the most harrowing account of a country under the rule of a murderous despot ever written. a masterpiece. a must read. seriously.
This was my original question and thanks for the great responses! If anyone is still inspired, any ideas for historical fiction surrounding the French Revolution?
I have to add Aztec. I love that book so much. It follows the sunset of the Aztec empire. Really fantastic.
-Erik.
French Revolution: Well, Tale of Two Cities is the obvious, and it is really pretty great if you haven't read it (though it's so far inferior to Dickens' best that I can't say it's one of my favorites). Victor Hugo has a really wonderful novel called Quatre-Vingt-Treize (1793), which I think should be more or less available in paperback–it was certainly in print in the mid-90s. I'm ignorant about other French-language stuff, though Michelet's French Revolution history is fantastic (history, not fiction) and there's also a film called Danton starring Gerard Depardieu that I liked when I saw it.
The Hilary Mantel novel I mentioned above is about the French Revolution; another thing well worth reading tho more on the truth than fiction thing is Richard Holmes's essay about Mary Wollstonecraft in Paris during the revolutionary years, it's in his collection Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer.
For Ancient Rome, try the "Masters of Rome" series by Colleen McCullough. For Africa, I've always like Wilbur Smith's sagas of the Courtneys and the Ballantynes.
RE: French Revolution
Anatole France's "The Gods Will Have Blood" is an excellent historical novel set during the Revolution.
Victor Hugo's hard to find "Ninety-Three" centers around a counter-revolutionary invasion during the Revolution.