### SECTION 1: WELCOME ###

Welcome to this jam-packed issue! – We have a work on display in the  mini fiction corner and also a historical whodunit – or rather the unanswerable question of Richard III.

Thanks to all for your contributions too, please feel free to send  any snippets of information and those international members out there, why not tell us a little about yourself or what new books there are in your country.

### SECTION 2: THE REVIEWS ###

Telegraph reviewer Helen Brown chooses Christmas fiction, including  these historical novels:

The Dream of Scipio by Iain Pears, Daily Telegraph, 23rd November, Helen Brown (SC)

"Those who enjoy the suspense of weighty truths gradually revealed, and crave... polish...could do worse than [this novel] set in

Provence at three key points in Western history: the final collapse of the Roman Empire, the Black Death, and the Second World War.

It's a novel about the nature of civilisation and its fragility, and may leave the reader with fresh insight into current affairs."

The Mulberry Empire by Philip Hensher, Daily Telegraph, 23rd November, Helen Brown (SC)

This novel "begins with shouts echoing over urban rooftops, but his skyline is one of mud and his scene 19th-century Kabul. This  colourful and erudite epic chronicles Britain's hubristic attempt to subdue Afghanistan."

Fragrant Harbour by John Lanchester, Daily Telegraph, 23rd November, Helen Brown (SC)

This novel "also deals with British withdrawal from an outpost. It follows four characters (including a 'shit hot' journalist and a Chinese nun) confronting corruption in the 70 years up to the Hong Kong handover. Lanchester's title is a dab of Chinese irony, as the brackish waters are anything but fragrant."

Oyster by John Biguenetis, Daily Telegraph, 23rd November, Helen Brown (SC)

"The tale of two rival shellfish-farming families in humid 1950s Louisiana. A bloated body is netted with the shrimp, oil companies move in and marriage is proposed. This is an absorbing yarn of  feuding clans, written with sloshing Bayou refinement."

Fingersmith by Sarah Waters, Daily Telegraph, 23rd November, Helen Brown (SC)

"A lurid waft of pea-souper London gothic, [this] will give you all the decadent chicanery and literary excess you might expect in a good Wilkie Collins novel."

Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides, Daily Telegraph, 23rd November, Helen Brown (SC)

"Due to a mutation of the fifth chromosome, the narrator [of this novel about identity] was born twice: first as a baby girl in Detroit in 1960, and later as a teenage boy in a Petoskey emergency room in 1974."

The Long Silence of Mario Salviati by Etienne Van Heerden, Daily Telegraph, 23rd November, Helen Brown (SC)

"Many secrets remain untold at the beginning of [this] South African writer's magical book, which tells of racial borders both crossed and fiercely defended in the sleepy Karoo town of Yearsonend. But when a young art critic comes in search of a sculpture by a local

mixed-race wood carver, she finds herself dredging up old stories of gold, ostrich feathers, stonemasonry and giraffes.

A flighty 'angel of place' hovers overhead as Van Heerden's words blast the reader's mind through a clear, blue African sky."

Winston's War by Michael Dobbs, Guardian 30 November, Chris Petit (SC)

"Dobbs's handsome costume drama takes its cheeky cue from a little-known historical fact: that Winston Churchill and the Soviet spy Guy Burgess knew each other when Churchill was up the political creek in 1938 and Burgess was at the BBC. Dobbs makes comic-strip history out

of Churchill's struggle for the wartime leadership, mixing past intrigue with contemporary propaganda."

The Office of Innocence by Thomas Keneally, Daily Telegraph 30 November, Francis King (SC)

Sydney 1942. Singapore has fallen and Australians, threatened with a Japanese invasion, feel that the British have abandoned them and their best hope lies with the Americans. "Like so many of Keneally's novels, The Office of Innocence deals with the consequences of war."

 Father Frank Darragh is a young priest whose "innocence is to be challenged by the demands of people who have experienced far more of the world than he has...Successive blows dealt by fate - or, as Darragh would see it, God - make for a story crammed with arresting incidents

but altogether too hectic in its contrivance to be wholly convincing."

The Office of Innocence by Thomas Keneally, Sunday Telegraph 1 December, David Robson (SC)

"Like Graham Greene in The Power and the Glory, Keneally has used the character of a flawed cleric to sift the wheat from the chaff in Catholicism; to find the kernel of goodness in the casing of habit and rigmarole.

If The Office of Innocence cannot quite be ranked with that great masterpiece, it is hewn from the same wood. Yet again, Keneally has produced a good book, a serious book and, because it is both, a stirring book."

The Radetzky March by Joseph Roth, Sunday Telegraph 1 December, Julia Flynn (SC)

Set in the Austro-Hungarian Empire from the confident 1850s to the death of Franz-Josef during WWI, this novel tells the story of three generations of the Trotta family, beginning with Lt. Trotta, the Hero of Solferino, who saves the Emperor's life.

"First published in 1933, and now reissued in a polished new translation by Michael Hofmann, [this novel] can fairly claim to be one of the great novels of the last century." Roth convincingly captures the emotional charge beneath the family's outward reserve. "His anthem for a vanished world has the intense, fleeting beauty of a sunset."

The Virgin Blue by Tracy Chevalier, The Times, 23rd November, Ruth Watts (SZ)

This is another of Chevalier's curiosity pieces dealing with witchcraft, illicit passions and the persecution of the Huguenots in the 16th century. Ella Turner, an American, moves to rural France where her dreams about the colour blue prompt the discovery of an ancestor called Isabelle Tournier whose life takes a disturbing turn when her hair begins to turn red, the traditional colour of the Virgin Mary's hair.

Death's Enemy by George Rosie, The Times, 30th November, James Urquhart (SZ)

This novel follows Mary Shelley's Victor Frankenstein from his childhood among Genevan aristocrats to his lonely attempts to galvanise a corpse intpo life. This Victor is a cold fish, lacking passion or emotional depth. "Rosie's electirican may be more historically plausible than Shelley's Gothic creation, but this novel lacks the moral anxiety that charged Shelley's hubristic tale of a modern Prometheus."

The newspapers are summing up the novels of 2003 and the Sunday Times of November 24th names the following historical novels amongst

its `overlooked gems.'

The Song of the King's by Barry Unsworth – the retelling of Agamemnon;s sacrifice of his daughter, Iphigenia, en route for the Trojan War. "suavely satiric and thought-provoking."

Peacetime by Robert Edric – Engineer, James Mercer is sent in 1946 to a remote fenland community to dismantle now-redundant gun-platforms and faces a barrage of class resentment, local animosity, not to mention a German POW and a Jewish survivor of the death-camps. "An intensely compelling read."

The Story of Lucy Gault by William Trevor – the 80 year repercussions of a tragedy within an Anglo-Irish family. "Pulsating with vitality by a superlative novelist at the height of his powers."

The following novels were deemed to be "sparkling performances: Fingersmith by Sarah Waters, The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber and The Necropolis Railway by Andrew Martin.

### SECTION 3: WHAT'S ON IN THE UK ###

Central Library Reading Group (Manchester) December 12, Pilgrim at Tinker's Creek by Annie Dillard. The group meets 12.30 - 1.30pm so bring your lunch! All meetings are held in the: Reception Room 2nd Floor Central Library St Peter's Square Manchester M2 5PD

For more information please contact Libby Tempest on 0161 234 1981

### SECTION 4: SNIPPETS ###

ANNE PERRY

The Daily Telegraph on 26 November featured an article about historical crime novelist Anne Perry and the real-life murder she committed 50 years ago as a schoolgirl in New Zealand. Here's the link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/family/main.jhtml;$sessionid$KNRVVGQSN505TQFIQMFCFFWAVCBQYIV0?xml=/family/2002/11/26/fmanne26.xml

MEDIEVAL

A forthcoming magazine has come to my attention. The Medievalist will be going into publication in the spring and will appear every two months. It will focus on British history mainly from 1066 to 1497 and will be aimed at "teachers, armchair historians, war-gamers and re-enactors, as well as those with a more specific interest in Britain's heritage."

If you wish to submit material (not fiction) please contact: J P Cotterill-Attaway, The Medievalist, 39 Cleveland Close, Radford, Nottingham, NG7 3BU

SOLANDER 12

The December issue of Solander, out soon, features interviews with Cecelia Holland who talks about her historical fiction including her latest novel The Soul Thief, Nicholas Griffin on his new novel The Masquerade, Megan Chance on witchcraft in Massachusetts, Margaret Doody on Aristotle as detective, and Manda Scott on her recreation of Iron Age Britain in the first of her trilogy on the life of the warrior Queen Boudica. We also feature the long-neglected Scottish historical fiction of  Neil Munro, the forgotten son of Abelard and Heloise, the reflections of an HF author, a special report on the 2002 HNS Conference with photographs, and more...

If you're not already an HNS member, you can make sure of all the 2002 issues of Solander and the Historical Novels Review by joining the Society via the HNS website (www.historicalnovelsociety.org).

### SECTION 5: WEBSITES OF THE FORTNIGHT ###

(The Historical Novel Society takes no responsibility for the contents of sites listed below)

http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/H/history/guide12/index.htm

l -Channel 4 website with information regarding Roman, Mediaeval, Tudor and Stuart England and Napoleon's Empire.

http://tudorhistory.org/ - Huge site with lots of Tudor content.

http://www.victorianlondon.org/ - Site with lots of content all about Victorian London, its people, recreation etc.

GOT A WEBSITE TO NOMINATE OR EVEN YOUR OWN SITE?

### SECTION 6: HISTORICAL SPEAKERS CORNER ###

***Anyone with a short fiction about a specific time period, article about a favourite author, historical character, or a short snippet

from their work in progress, can send them in to be displayed here.

Why not have your say about something you feel strongly about?***

RICHARD III – VILLAIN OR HERO? – What does everyone think about this subject? I recently visited Middleham Castle, Richard's dwelling during his time as Duke of Gloucester.

MURDEROUS HUNCHBACK or simply INTELLIGENT KING? Did he murder the two princes' for his own ambition or did he try to protect them until they matured?

The most interesting fact is that now we have the technology and science to solve this riddle, Westminster Abbey are refusing to release the supposed remains of the two Prince's for examination. The evidence lies very heavy at Richard's door for the two young boy's murders and it looks certain that he condoned it. What a complete turn from his loyalty to his brother King Edward, to murdering this brother's sons in cold blood.

### SECTION 7: READER'S CLASSIFIED ###

Even if you do not have a question or request for info – you can use this section to advertise your knowledge, so that you can help other readers who may need to know something about your period of interest. (You can contact anyone below by mailing me at mark@kingorparliament.com)

AFRICAN HISTORY - Marina Maxwell is knowledgeable about Southern and Central African colonial period c. 1840-1960 in particular. She is also happy to be a contact for anyone wanting to track down copies of new or second hand Australian historical novels. Michael Hunt is also interested in the period.

17th CENTURY ENGLISH HISTORY – Patrika Salmon is interested in this era, Mark Turnbull, Neville Firman and Felicity Barnaby are knowledgeable about it. Mark is especially interested in the English Civil War. Neville is interested mainly in radical political and

religious movements, Levellers, Quakers etc, and also Cromwell. He has completed a Ph.D on early Quakerism.

BRONZE AGE – Patrika Salmon is only interested in this era.

FELICITY BARNABY - I am very interested in C17 history. Until last year I was a member of the Sealed Knot (Slannings) and hope to rejoin for next year. I joined originally to research some historical fiction I was writing, set in the Civil War, and of course discovered that SK is a

way of life in itself. I now have three (unpublished) historical novels, two of which are set in the Civil War, and the third at the time of the Popish Plot. I am trying to start one centring on Monmouth's rebellion and Sedgemoor, but I am finding it very hard to get it going at the moment. Living as I do some distance from big libraries etc, I really need to discover how to do my research on the Internet! I haven't progressed very far with it yet. I enjoy reading the Newsletter, and find it both useful and stimulating.

If anyone can offer any sites or information about the Monmouth/Sedgemoor era, Felicity would be most grateful. Felicity – you could try this website for a little info: www.somersetgateway.com/history/monmouth/essay.htm

GOT A NOTICE/REQUEST/QUESTION?

### SECTION 8: HNS INTERNATIONAL ###

If YOU are an international member, why not write a bit about yourself?

FINALLY – NOW IS THE TIME TO ENJOY THE PAST!

Visit the Historical Novel Society Website at www.historicalnovelsociety.org

 Join the Historical Novel Society and receive our quarterly Historical Novels Review and twice yearly magazine – you can become a member via the HNS Website. Have your say in a discussion about historical fiction on ListServ – sign up from the HNS Website

Send me an email! Give me some feedback. Write an e-book review for the Newsletter. Let me know about a good review or interesting article you've seen in the press. Ask a question. Make a point. Contact me at mark@kingorparliament.com (Items submitted may be edited.)

Mark

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