![]() ![]() So here’s the personal context that affected my reading of The Heir: I’m on the “stickler” end of the spectrum, but because my knowledge of history comes from reading a lot of fiction written or set in the 19th century, only certain details will trip me up. I’d be on much stronger ground criticizing a romance set among the mudlarks of Victorian England (fat chance) than a Medieval one. Nor is every reader an expert in every era. ![]() Sometimes what we think we know about a time period is shaped as much by literary convention as historical fact. ![]() Moreover, not everything people criticize as an error actually is one. Any depiction of the past is colored by the time in which it was written. Of course, it’s far more complicated than that. It’s a hard topic to discuss without making everyone defensive about her tastes: you’re either a stuck-up snob ruining everyone’s fun or an idiot who can’t spot an error at 20 paces. The basics of the debate could be summed up like this: one side says that you shouldn’t write historical romance if you don’t care about the history the other, that they just like a good story and don’t care about accuracy. ![]() For some good discussions of that topic, check out VacuousMinx, lux lucas, and Sarah Frantz, who links to even more at the start of her post. Reading Grace Burrowes’ The Heir (Sourcebooks, 2010) raised for me the vexed question of the importance of historical accuracy in historical romance. ![]()
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