Good Intentions…
So, last night, when I was supposed to be catching up on my blog reading and writing, what did I do instead? I found new blogs to subscribe to. Sigh.
I started with the best of intents–Carla Nayland had kindly left a comment on my blog a few days ago, so I dropped by her site to return the favor. And promptly got sucked into a very interesting discussion on what does and doesn’t appeal to readers of historical fiction. (part 1 and part 2)
Cool, I thought. I wonder if there’s a big difference between what readers of historical fiction and readers of historical romances like? I should blog on it, I decided.
But in catching up on my reading I discovered Robyn over at Snarkling Clean had already beat me to the topic.
From Carla’s I clicked over to Susan Higginbotham’s site (I ain’t writing its real name out ‘cuz it’s long and I’m tired) and found, along with some fascinating posts, 10 More Rules for Writing Historical Fiction. What a hoot! But where were the first ten rules?
That sent me on to Sarah’s Bookarama, another great site. She’s gathered a whole slew of “rules” for writing historical fiction from various authors. There’s the original rules (Alan Fisk), Prehistoric (Sarah Johnson), Arthurian (Vivien Tyler), Medieval, Elizabeth Chadwick, and Feminist (India Edgehill). (All of these are originally from Solander, the magazine of the Historical Novel Society. I hope I got all the acknowledgements correct. If I didn’t, please forgive.)
UPDATE: Whoops! Left off Alianore’s rules for Edward II and Isabella! My bad.
I’m waiting for the Regency, Georgian, American Civil War, etc. If someone doesn’t write them soon, I’ll have to, and I really don’t have the time for one more project.
Needless to say, after getting swept away with my clicking, I didn’t get very caught up. Plus I was a bad mama and didn’t get to my writing because of the surfing. So it was after 2 am when I finally started typing, and after 3 when I crawled into bed. Of course, the Punkin decided that 5:30 am was the proper time to get up. Arghhh.
Anyhoo, now I’m really going to post this, catch up on Romancing the Blog and Writing and Rambling, then get to my laptop. I promise…
March 9th, 2006 at 12:16 am
I use Blogarithm.com to catalog all the blogs I visit. they send me a daily email as to who has updated….I average visiting 28 blogs a day!
March 9th, 2006 at 12:49 am
Holy Cow! I use Bloglines to do the same thing, but I only have 15 feeds. But I bet Bernita has even you beat–everywhere (and I do mean everywhere) I go I see her comments
March 9th, 2006 at 7:51 am
Huh?
I’ve put blogs on my favorites list and go click on them every day, more than once - the old fashioned way.
March 9th, 2006 at 10:02 am
If you do write some rules, Nessili, make sure to tell Sarah Cuthbertson about them. I think she’s collecting a list. The ones she posted were all originally published in the magazine of the Historical Novel Society (Solander) and she re-posted them after receiving permission from the original authors. But as she says, there is plenty of scope for more!
While on the subject, did you see Alianore’s Rules for fiction on Edward II and Isabella? She left a comment on my post, but if you didn’t read the comment thread you might have missed it.
I read blogs Bernita’s way too. But I am told that the next release of Internet Explorer will have a feature called RSS, that will check your favourite sites for you and will tell you when they’ve updated (thereby saving you having to click round them yourself. Progress, eh?)
March 9th, 2006 at 11:38 am
Thanks for the heads-up, Carla–I added Alianore’s list in too.
As far as reading blogs goes, Bloglines (bloglines.com) is really easy to use. You go to one site, set up the sites you want to read, and it updates your list as soon as a new post is put up. Don’t even have to read your email. You can also read them on that site–no click throughs necessary (unless you want to read the comments). And if you do click through, it opens up a fresh window so you don’t lose the list of blogs you were reading.
And that’s where I’m off to right now, since it’s early enough in the day that I’m not neck deep in other stuff yet.
March 9th, 2006 at 4:59 pm
As a North Carolinian, I think some American Civil War rules for historical fiction are sorely needed. Get cracking, and thanks for stopping by!
March 10th, 2006 at 6:14 am
Hi there!
Thanks for the mention of my Edward II and Isabella rules! Enjoying your blog.
March 12th, 2006 at 7:24 am
By the way, you may also like Gabriele Campbell’s Rules for Scottish Romances.
March 13th, 2006 at 1:20 am
I do like…I shall add in an update to my update
March 14th, 2006 at 2:15 pm
Hi nessili
Thanks for linking to my blog and the notorious Rules for Historical Fiction genres. As Carla said, do please let me know if you write some of your own so we can spread the word.
I’m enjoying your blog!