Reading Historical Fiction Often Leads to Reading History

Recently an organization asked me to speak on the hypothesis that is the title of this presentation. Many of the group’s members read historical fiction and this often spurs them to pick up books written about the events that provide the context of the novel. So, the question is why?

While reading the CliffsNotes or Classics Illustrated comics is not a substitute for researching a PhD thesis, a novel can be thought provoking and informative about the historical period in which the novel takes place. This presentation provides Marc’s views on why a historical novel could spark interest about a period in history and “encourage” the reader to search out related biographies, memoirs as well as historical texts.

As an award-winning author of four Amazon #1 Best Sellers, Marc is uniquely qualified to provide insight on how he weaves research into the plot to make the story more interesting as well as historically and operational accurate. Often times, his research leads to changing the story or the characters. In the speech, he will provide examples from several of his novels in how he incorporates tidbits into the books to make both the characters and story more interesting.

In the end, what interests readers of historical fiction is, well, the history behind the story. And, once a period has piqued a reader’s interest, he/she is likely to look for autobiographys, memoirs, and books on that particularly period in history.