tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post3079440918219845326..comments2024-03-28T13:06:28.024-04:00Comments on Jungle Red Writers: Detectives Beyond Borders' Peter Rozovsky and "Crime During Wartime"Jungle Red Writershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16646429819267618412noreply@blogger.comBlogger45125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-2136331071060385712014-09-12T23:26:09.580-04:002014-09-12T23:26:09.580-04:00And then this turns up.And then <a href="http://tinyurl.com/q7lg7dx" rel="nofollow">this turns up</a>.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-7986748582069276232014-09-11T23:13:52.469-04:002014-09-11T23:13:52.469-04:00Hmm, a psychologist, you say? Freud had done some ...Hmm, a psychologist, you say? Freud had done some of his important early work then. I wonder if that war was the first studied for its psychological effect on those who returned from it.<br /><br />Since history takes in everything, I have no doubt that everybody would be interested in it.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-37050430924458217522014-09-11T22:23:47.894-04:002014-09-11T22:23:47.894-04:00No, Peter. Not that John Hart. The book is called ...No, Peter. Not that John Hart. The book is called There will be killing. A wonderful mystery and a superb look into that war. Keeps you guessing all the way through, it is written by a veteran of that war. A psychologist who no doubt witnessed some of the appalling atrocities. In terms of historical look back, it is very valuable . As an aside, but relevant, I think..it has been reviewed by a few women .all have endorsed it. Women are very interested in history.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-78811258404204417622014-09-11T18:14:03.322-04:002014-09-11T18:14:03.322-04:00Anon, is that the Edgar-winning John Hart? The boo...Anon, is that the Edgar-winning John Hart? The book is subtitled "a novel of war and murder," which is about as in your face as a subtitle can get. Sounds worth a look; thanks.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-83259860181188836042014-09-11T16:57:50.826-04:002014-09-11T16:57:50.826-04:00Pat, I'd say war on an industrial scale plus f...Pat, I'd say war on an industrial scale plus family material of that sort is an ideal background for fiction. I am beginning to think that might be my next historical interest. I read <i>The Man Without Qualities</i> last year, and I may have to read the war poets one day.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-33002744775089660172014-09-11T16:36:33.960-04:002014-09-11T16:36:33.960-04:00Peter, to me modern history begins with WW1. I hav...Peter, to me modern history begins with WW1. I have a Huston Family history which includes some letters a great uncle wrote from France in the final months of the Great War. I hauled that out recently to see where he was and when, what outfit, etc. since so much of my historical fiction reading is that time period.Pat Dnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-79892822491015182912014-09-11T15:50:06.263-04:002014-09-11T15:50:06.263-04:00This, of course, applies equally to male character...This, of course, applies equally to male characters. You wouldn't want to give a male character anachronistic attitudes, either. Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-24245932328503312662014-09-11T15:45:53.731-04:002014-09-11T15:45:53.731-04:00Right, and it's the author's job to tap in...Right, and it's the author's job to tap into that, to write about women of the 1930s (or 1170s), and not to make them post-1970s women in period dress-to give the characters ways to express their strength in the way that people of their time would have.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-79751902013286773662014-09-11T15:40:22.400-04:002014-09-11T15:40:22.400-04:00I find that the attitude of "women just weren...I find that the attitude of "women just weren't like that back then" says more about the speaker than the women of the past.Susan Elia MacNealhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00349842866995778987noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-26118205887705427502014-09-11T15:36:46.740-04:002014-09-11T15:36:46.740-04:00Peter, it's not like women were only strong po...Peter, it's not like women were only strong post 1970. Look at the women who really were SOE agents. Look at Martha Gellhorn. Look at Pauli Murray. While these women weren't the norm, they certainly weren't unicorns.Susan Elia MacNealhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00349842866995778987noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-66979012170200828652014-09-11T15:12:38.003-04:002014-09-11T15:12:38.003-04:00Just finished a book by John Hart and Olivia Rupre...Just finished a book by John Hart and Olivia Ruprecht.<br />Riveting, shocking indictment of a horrible war. A mystery, as well as a well drawn picture of how wars demean our very humanity. I couldn't put this book down. Really a harrowing read but superbly written, and a reminder that we must look at worst of our history along with the good.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-55665263519685950712014-09-11T15:04:36.027-04:002014-09-11T15:04:36.027-04:00FC, another way to get around the dilemma is by ch...FC, another way to get around the dilemma is by choosing one's setting and characters carefully. <a href="http://detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/2007/11/mistress-of-art-of-death-question-for.html" rel="nofollow">Ariana Franklin</a> wrote about a female physician in 12th-century England. How the hell does one pull that off?<br /><br />Franklin made two wise decisions. She made the character Italian, and female physicians did exist in Italian at the time, and she then brought that character to England. Such an outsider would naturally describe the strange features of her new land, and this let Franklin offer a lot of colorful detail that might have come across as an information dump had and English character narrated it.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-73151473796495168202014-09-11T14:53:04.624-04:002014-09-11T14:53:04.624-04:00Oh Susan, your comment just burns me up! Maybe wom...Oh Susan, your comment just burns me up! Maybe women were only reading historical fiction set in those periods because that's what was available, that's what sold, and that's what writers wrote who wanted to get published. Such a circular path!<br /><br />And Peter, I think you get around the dilemma by really delving into the the context--while women's roles might have largely been circumscribed by society at any particular time, there were always women who created the life they needed. If you look, you'll find them--the artists, the explorers, the scientists, the writers. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-89996466018278655312014-09-11T14:48:03.634-04:002014-09-11T14:48:03.634-04:00Susan, maybe that explains why Charles and Carolin...Susan, maybe that explains why Charles and Caroline Todd choose to write under the name of Charles.<br /><br />Of course, you raise yet another problem that confronts writers of historical fiction: avoiding anachronistic attitudes. How does one write a story directed at women, with a woman as protagonist, and set in the 1930s and 1940s without letting post-1970s political and social attitudes pervade the book? How do you negotiate that problem?Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-56954444113979311672014-09-11T14:47:06.649-04:002014-09-11T14:47:06.649-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-47023035831183664692014-09-11T14:38:48.866-04:002014-09-11T14:38:48.866-04:00Welcome, Peter!
I will say that when I was first ...Welcome, Peter!<br /><br />I will say that when I was first shopping Mr. Churchill's Secretary around (in 2000-2008), a lot of agents and editors said that "Women don't read war novels, especially 20th century war novels. They read Tudor/Elizabethan, Regency, and Victorian." It's so great to see that things have changed.Susan Elia MacNealhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00349842866995778987noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-41604244199238042192014-09-11T14:28:26.536-04:002014-09-11T14:28:26.536-04:00Pat D ... I also enjoy other eras but this 20th c...<i>Pat D ... I also enjoy other eras but this 20th century time period is fascinating to me.</i><br /><br />Yes, I think many of us want to know what created the conditions under which we live, about odd things our parents said or our grandparents did. Recent history can be a kind of personal exploration that way. I wonder how far back one has to go before the personal stops.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-23918912199028737192014-09-11T14:23:44.312-04:002014-09-11T14:23:44.312-04:00FChurch said...
... I enjoy historical fiction th...<i>FChurch said...<br /> ... I enjoy historical fiction that gets the details right--and not just the dates, etc., but the characters--authors who are able to make their characters real in the context of the time they are writing about.</i> <br /><br />Right. If you're just going to get the dates, just write what is misleadingly called history, but in fact is mere chronicle. And if you're just going to get the characters right, why not set your crime story in a period you know better, and save yourself the work?<br /><br />Credible, compelling historical fiction that lives up to both halves of the name must be the most difficult kind of fiction to write. I am in awe when authors do it well.<br />Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-926060417924177492014-09-11T14:18:04.574-04:002014-09-11T14:18:04.574-04:00I should add that the novel is set amid religious ...I should add that the novel is set amid religious strife in seventeenth-century England, so one could call it a wartime novel. It meets every criterion that I and the commenters here have come up with. It gives a heartbreaking sense of life at the time, a sense not just of what the historical conflicts were at the time but of what they meant in everyday life, and it does not hit the reader over the head. It is one of the best novels I have ever read.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-91300277018315488022014-09-11T14:15:29.181-04:002014-09-11T14:15:29.181-04:00Kathy, if you do check out Detectives Beyond Borde...Kathy, if you do check out Detectives Beyond Borders, do searches for "history", "historical crime fiction," "historical fiction," and "historical mysteries." I write about the subject frequently. <br /><br />I can recommend to you and to anyone else who reads this the novel <a href="http://detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/2011/12/ronan-bennetts-historical-crime-novel.html" rel="nofollow"><i>Havoc, in Its Third Year</i></a>, by Ronan Bennett. My discussion of the book begins thus: "I may have found the perfect historical novel."Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-41526161614775275182014-09-11T14:07:21.637-04:002014-09-11T14:07:21.637-04:00Rhys: In your 1930s series, how do you handle the ...Rhys: In your 1930s series, how do you handle the historical fact that readers know another war is coming, but your characters do not?Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-58303780850585348802014-09-11T14:03:05.168-04:002014-09-11T14:03:05.168-04:00And to make it gripping, I agree with Hank - it...<i>And to make it gripping, I agree with Hank - it's about the characters, the people, not the dates. </i><br /><br />Mary: It's about the characters <i>and</i> the dates, and the two cannot be separated.<br /><br />Some of you may remember Warren Beatty's movie <i>Reds</i>. I remember thinking, big deal. It's a love story between Bearry's character and Diane Keaton's, with the Russian Revolution thrown in to flatter the audience;s intellectual vanity and Beatty's. First-rate historical fiction has to make better use of history than that.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-6720297587695180122014-09-11T13:58:46.050-04:002014-09-11T13:58:46.050-04:00No other country visiting, I'm afraid, but I h...No other country visiting, I'm afraid, but I have read a few novels that intrigued me enough to look into the history of a place or an event; Taylor Caldwell's "Dear and Glorious Physician" comes immediately to mind. However, I seldom wait to check it out until I've finished the novel . . . .Joan Emersonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06810313925049108163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-9339328349520606482014-09-11T13:56:24.528-04:002014-09-11T13:56:24.528-04:00Ellen: Adrian McKinty, whom I mentioned toward the...Ellen: Adrian McKinty, whom I mentioned toward the end of my post, set his "Troubles" trilogy in Northern Ireland in the early in 1980s, a period through which he lived as a child. I don't know if anyone would consider the books historical fiction, though they will certainly give a sense of what it must have been like to be around at the time. More to the point, I think they'll help readers understand the political and social circumstances to the time.Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1001156153899984046.post-87388984412234654892014-09-11T13:51:26.493-04:002014-09-11T13:51:26.493-04:00Joan, have you ever become so interested in a give...Joan, have you ever become so interested in a given period or country after a reading a novel set there that you then read up on the country's history--or visited the country?Peter Rozovskyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09977933481463759162noreply@blogger.com