Starting next week, I’m going to be focusing on interviews for Echoes of Liberty, the agorist-libertarian anthology I’m featured in, which is publishing the last week of September. Expect to see interviews with my fellow authors and who knows what all else will be coming our way. I’ll return to the other authors in October.
Objects in View will publish October 4. I am actually hard at work on a 5th book that is outside of the Daermad Cycle and Transformation Project universes. What If … Wasn’t has been 10 years in the writing. It’s a much more personal book and it is literary fiction. I told you, I’m a multi-genre author. You can check out tidbits on Wattpad.
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I have always loved historical fiction when it is well written, which is why I haven’t written it myself … until now.
Several months ago, someone sent me a link to Clarion Call, a product of the Agorist Writing Workshop. Since writing my first short story in 20 years last summer, I’ve been interested in submitting to more anthologies, and I was thrilled that someone would suggest it.
But then I looked at the required topic – historical fiction. I hadn’t written a historical fiction piece since the 4th grade when a teacher forced me to do a short story with a 1880s western theme. That was the story that awoke my writing bug, but I had a miserable time doing it. I just HATED it. But ….
Clarion Call is a market-libertarian publication and they wanted that theme incorporated into the historical fiction. And then the guidelines said a word that warmed my heart – speculative.
For the uninitiated, speculative historical fiction (sometimes called alternative history) looks at the actual past and changes one critical aspect and then asks “What would have resulted from that change?”
If you’re familiar with the show Sliders, it’s a similar plot device.
I have all sorts of experience with speculative fiction. I quickly chose my pivotal change. Writing historical fiction, however, is not the same as writing fantasy. Although I research extensively to assure I don’t jar anyone out of the story by defying the laws of the universe, I can play fast and loose with some elements in fantasy because Daermad is not Earth. With historical fiction, you can’t do that. You have to know your period so that when you choose to change something, it feels believable to the readers.
So while I knew what my pivotal change would be, I needed to research my era to provide believable context. I’ve always liked the Founding era which I combined with old family stories. My research taught me that some of those stories, like most family stories, weren’t wholly accurate, but sometimes it didn’t matter. I dug into the history of a town that exists today and was squeaky new in 1787. I researched historical figures who would have been there at the time. I learned George Washington, Alexander Hamilton and James Madison weren’t the wonderful people we are taught to believe they are. I finally figured out why the women in my mother’s family aren’t good doormats and haven’t been for the 150 years we have knowledge of. I even managed to include a small taste of potential romance.
Those are hints of what you might find in my story when the anthology comes out in the fall.
I may try more speculative historical fiction in the future. Admittedly, I did more research for a short story than I’ve done for the entire Daermad Cycle and probably as much as I did for Life As We Knew It. Historical fiction is work in a way that modern-day tales and fantasies are not. Still, I liked the product and, surprisingly, I liked the process. With such a body of research, the story may wish to be expanded — though I would have to wait two years to publish it. I’m pretty busy with other projects, so it would be a work-in-progress for that long anyway.
Sometimes writers need to be bumped out of their comfort zone and stretch their wings. Although I certainly want to finish my ongoing projects, I admit that other projects also want to be written. Sadly, I don’t have unlimited time in which to write, but hang on because there is more coming.
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