A Question for authors and readers

Here’s a question for you. How much history can a romance writer alter for the sake of a story without being accused of betraying his/her craft?

I’ve given this a lot of thought, because I’ve done just that, intentionally. With Heartsong, the medieval from the 13th century, I had my hero going into Wales for hostages. Taking hostages was a practice used during the medieval ages, but there is no record I could find of Edward I seeking hostages from Wales. I also changed his son’s birth a year to make the timeline fit my story.

When I first began to write, I had the scene of a US Civil War battle wrong. I caught the mistake, and it was my mistake, before the book saw the light of day. Now, even I would consider that poor research on the author's part. But, I still wonder if a historical romance author can alter the date of an event or a character's participation in an event, without an avalanche of objections being heaped on her/his head.

I agree, there are some events, some occasions as an author you cannot alter. An example might be the date of a war's beginning or ending, the corination of a king or queen, or their deaths. But, I know writers who have included a book character in a event or at a particular occasion and I suspect many will continue to be do so because, after all, it’s fiction. My concern is how much can an author alter?

The reason I'm asking is simple. In one of my books in process, I have my hero coming up with a plan to stop the great London fire. Can I do that, or is it stretching the truth a bit too far? After all, it certainly wasn't his idea because I made him up.

I'd love to hear your opinion.

Allison Knight
"Heartsong" Named
Best Novel of the Year
available from Champagne Books

The Historical Voice

Like many romance authors I considered trying another genre. I read historical romance, I wrote historical romance, but I gave considerable thought to writing a contemporary romance, which I did. It wasn’t easy. A friend told me, “You don’t have a contemporary voice, you have a historical voice.”

That gave me pause. What did she mean I had a historical voice as opposed to a contemporary voice? I thought about it a lot. What made my voice so different from the voices of contemporary authors? In fact, what makes a historical voice?

I decided to compare some of the contemporary authors to well known historical novelists. Sharing my findings may be no surprise to you, but they were to me and led to other questions.

What did I find? The most noticeable difference is the dialogue between contemporary characters. That I expected. But I noticed other discernable changes in the use of words describing a scene, a character, a place. There is an ease to the modern novel quite removed from the historical tale. For one, contemporary romances contain clichés, and modern turns of phrase not even known a hundred years ago. But I also noticed something else. There is a more formal approached to the historical story, not something you can reach out and touch, but it’s a real. Words are used in a certain pattern, fewer contractions, more formal address. The age of the words used now counts. The heroine of a historical romance set in the west a hundred years ago would never use the expression, ‘over and out!”

The characters have a tendency, even if it’s a humorous historical romance, to be more formal in their conversations. The heroine of an eighteen century adventure would never tell the hero, “Don’t go there,” if she didn’t want to discuss something.

All this analysis leads to another question. How do you develop a historical voice, and can you accomplish such a task? I don’t have the answer to that, but I have a feeling that the author of a historical novel is someone who thinks of and might even admire the simpler, less complicated life of days ago. Someone who perhaps likes a bit of formality, an individual who enjoys hearing historical tidbits, admires the style and beauty of historical dress and the grandness of some time periods. Someone who instinctively would be attracted to books by Jane Austin, Charles Dickens to name just two.

That doesn’t mean a historical author doesn’t enjoy the here and now. Where would we be without computers, printing presses, POD, microwaves, and the automobile? We’d be nowhere, and I doubt any historical romance author would willing trade a today with yesteryear. But true to the nature of the historical romance writer – we can pretend for awhile and go back in time.

So, how would you describe a historical voice?

Allison Knight
www.AllisonKnight.com
"A Treasure For Sara"
available now from Champagne Books