More recommended reading

[abendgules]

I continue to have a low taste for whodunnits, begun in my yoof - I suspect early exposure to Ellis Peters is to blame for my initially 12th century persona, and my first Society name.

But I've grown pickier of my authors, particularly in historic whodunnits, a genre I think Ms Peters created nearly singlehandedly. There are a handful of writers who predate her, but almost everyone writes in their own time period...and only become period pieces (Poirot, Sherlock, and Lord Peter Wimsey) with passing years.

At any rate, I've grown pickier; if you can simply lift the story and put it in contemporary time period with few changes of clothing, I'm not interested. It's the ones that pick up the period political events, and represent unpopular social opinions convincingly as part of the story that impress me.

So I've really enjoyed Catriona McPhereson's Dandy Gilver stories - I found the first one early this year, when I was headed to Dance Moot in Queensferry. It's set post WWI, when Nothing was Ever the Same Again. And while I don't know much about the period, I'm enjoying her depiction of a gently-bred minor-gentry wife, bored to tears, who uses her slightly clueless society persona to good effect while solving puzzles. Well worth investigating.

Comments

[ethnowoman.livejournal.com]

I recently read "Blackout" and "All Clear" by Connie Willis, both set in WWII, with lots of meaty historical detail, examining the concept (in a very long view) of what it means to be a hero. Lovely books, if rather complicated.

[m-nivalis.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the book rec. I'll see if the library has them!

Not a whodunnit, but if you want books with a good sense of the historical period, I would recommend Jo Graham's historical novels (assuming you don't feel the need for 110% realism, as she has a strand of supernaturalness in them (reincarnation etc)). Her latest novel, The general's mistress, is out this month, and the ARCs have gotgood reviews.

[bend-gules.livejournal.com]

Would that be the Numinous World series?

ARC?? hunh?

[m-nivalis.livejournal.com]

Would that be the Numinous World series?
Yes. I take it you're familiar with her works?

ARC = Advanced Reader's Copy, usually for reviews, can include minor errors (i.e. not the final print).

[liadethornegge.livejournal.com]

I really like Lindsey Davis series about Marcus Didius Falco. First book called "The Silver Pigs", set in the first century AD

[hayleygreen.livejournal.com]

Ooh I second both Connie Willis' Blackout and All Clear, just finished listening to them on audiobook and if you think they're somewhat confusing on paper, at least you can go back and check dates and stuff! The first time through I was sitting on my backstep listening, got to a bit where Polly's out in a raid when our Lancaster roared overhead and scared me half to death. We're right under the flightpath from the Warplane Heritage Museum if the wind is right, and he wasn't very far off the ground. A squadron of them must have been earthshaking.

And, I'm currently reading Lindsey Davis' A Body in the Bath House, number 13 in her Falco series - for the umpteenth time, I usually go through the series about every 18 months or so - and I see from her website that the first book in her new series will be released in April 2013 (June here in The Colonies: some familiar characters to look forward to!

Cat