Looking at It Friom Another Direction

I have another question about a picture.  See below.

Let's Try That Again

I should know better than to ask a bunch of authors and heavy readers to come up with captions for a picture. 

I asked you all to look at a graphic I made and tell me what you saw.  You can find both the image and the fabulous and highly creative suggestions you came up with at http://nanhawthorne.blogspot.com/2010/02/what-does-this-picture-say-to-you.html .

One person out of all of you got what I was after.. but that's not a complaint.. it was exactly what I wanted to know. I learned that I make really interesting images... and I need a new one for my new project!

What It Was All About

My husband and I are setting up a new Amazon Associates bookseller site dedicated to books published by authors who have run into a brick wall with the now quite risk adverse publishing industry.  You've heard it called the "vanity press".  We think of it as the "creativity press".   These are folks who saw the wall and went over or around it.  Some of the books coming out of this independent publishing movement are every bit as and often better than what you will find on brick and mortar bookstores.  The trouble is that the usual ways you learn about books largely exhibit a bias against indie books.  They are hanging onto stereotypes that need to go the way of all the others.  These books are well written, well produced, and definitely filling a niche in danger of becoming vacant.  If you have a genre interest or other nonmainstream interesst or approach, you will want to know your type of book is out there.. and know where to find it.

And that is where Books Outside the Box comes in.    Jim and I are setting up business as an Amazon Associates bookseller web site dedicated exclusibvely to indie books.  These will be self published, POD published, and very small press books.  We plan to market the site broadly enough to create awareness of these treasures so that, as we devoutly believe should be the case, readers regain control from the multileveraged corporate world as to what is out there to read.

So that is what that image was supposed to say... but it didn't quite do it.

Your Next Assignment! 

You don't need to pixk up a pencil or crayons.. just tell us, what images should go into a logo for a web site called "Books Outside the Box"?

Leave your comments below.  And thanks again.. and for all the wonderful laughs.

What Does This Picture Say To YOU?

    

What does this image say to you?  

Please provide your caption in the Comments section.

Thanks!   

What Historical Novelists Do

It occurred to me recently that the old sobriquet applied to science fiction, speculative fiction, applies to historical fiction as well. Yes, depending on the story and whether ctual historical figures appear in a novel, the author tries to depict life in  another time as accurately as possible. That's an important factor, but it cannot be the artistry that makes the history meaningful and truly evocative.

I have been reading Morgan Llywelyn's Grania: She-King of the Irish Seas, and both the merits and the demerits of the novel highlighted for me just where the speculative aspect of historical fiction comes into play. The historical novelist starts with facts, whether about the historical personage or the events and setting appropriate to the time. Where we have documented facts about, say, Grania ui Maille's life, the author can record these or choose to skip any particular event. That's the second thing we do: we look at all we know about a person, place, event, or circumstance, and we choose which to represent in a fictional way. That is one thing I think was wrong with this book. So much of Grania's life was repetitive that it seemed to me some of the instances could have been left out. As a pirate and warrior, Grania would attack a merchant ship or make a raid on a town, get caught, suffer imprisonment or lose a loved one instead, then be released, go back home to reflect on what happened, and inevitably go back to what got her in trouble in the first place. In order to justify this the author explained each incident in the same way, that Grania felt responsible for her people, that she loved being free and wild, etc.

This aspect, the repetitive explanation, leads to the third thing historical novelists do, and that is where speculation comes in. I truly believe that this is both why people read historical novels instead of biographies and is also the hardest part of the craft. It is our job to look at the person and the facts and illustrate what we guess is the motivation for what happens. Why did Grania keep risking disaster? In other works, why did Llewellyn the Great forgive his wife Joanna’s infidelity? Why did Raymond of Toulouse desert during the Battle of Merzifon? Why did Elizabeth I stay unmarried? So often history offers us hints, but rarely does it give us definitive answers. Even when a historical figure writes down why s/he did what s/he did, can we trust that person to be honest with him/herself? In this novel the author has a big task. The historical "Grace O'Malley" is a tangle of contradictions. She appears in the historical record to switch loyalties and to betray her own people, coming back to them and fighting for them, only to switch again. One might speculate whether the woman was no more than an opportunist, or, like Llywelyn does in the novel, find other motivations, individual motivations, to ascribe this peripatetic life. That's where the book shines. You do see the speculative character based on a real person grow and you understand better her particular choices.

Those who rail at a historical novelist for an interpretation of events usually miss the point. The point is we don not know for certain. I have long believed that fiction writing is a sort of more humane form of the science of psychology. We write, and others read, a novel to examine the facts, add what we know of the human heart and mind, and we explain, suggest, and illustrate motivations and feelings. It is creative writing, but more than that it is speculative writing. It is storytelling that suggests "Perhaps?"

Making Llight of the Dark Ages: henry and Margaret at Dinner

Fun Medieval Stuff You Can Have

  

medieval-novels.com is now more than just books.. as if that wasn't enough!

  

Now you can find medieval and historical fiction theme imprinted items for men, women, kids.. even pets.

  

Just go to medieval-novels and more at CafePress.

t-shirts

outerwear

mugs

kids' items

notecards

buttons

stickers

mousepads

teddy bear

intimate apparel

clocks

posters

aprons

and more!

Don't forget, we have over 1,200 novels set in the early and later Middle Ages and Renaissance at

medieval-novels.commedieval-novels.com!

The New Digital Talking Book machine

While we are on the subject of How I Read... here is a video about the new digital reading machine I just received from my local Library for the Blind.



It's interesting that they say you can download books from Bookshare.org, the topic of yesterday's post. I'll have to find out what they mean, since I thought the machine could only read audio books. Perhaps they are referrring to first converting text books to audio, and then using them. I will let you know.

About Bookshare.org and Benetech: A Video

By the way, I just noticed that Nan Hawthorne's Booking History hit 400 posts last week!

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This blog's editor is not only an author whose work is on BookShare.org, but is also a patron of the service.