Here’s what I’ve been reading and listening to around the web and the world this week:
A.
Get to know Jess Steven Hughes and his book The Sign of the Eagle about Roman Britain on Maria Grace’s blog Link here
B.
In a definitely crazy period of time for me, here’s a very funny cartoon making fun of social media by embracing our inner dog-love. Perfect! Link here
C.
I saw James Rollins and Rebecca Cantrell last night at the Poisoned Pen. If you read my reviews, you know I’m a fan of Becca’s Hannah Vogel series set in Nazi Germany. The latest collaboration between these 2 authors is Innocent Blood. At one point last night, James Rollins chatted about his long standing critique group (20 yrs) and he jokingly said “they knew me with my pants down.” Rebecca and he had a bit of repartee on that and Jim kidded that maybe critique groups should have to strip off a piece of clothing for each grammatical error and that would encourage cleaning up one’s prose before bringing to group. Ha! That would add a new dimension. Glad I know my grammar!
D.
I always have more books to read (and review) than I know what to do about. But if you are in the category of looking for books and conversation about them the LA Review of Books might have something interesting for you. A book club where the book is delivered to you and you get to talk to the author about it? Link here
E. 
Our upcoming (Feb 8, 1-4 pm) AZ Historical Novel Society speaker, Shona Patel’s Teatime for the Firefly has been reviewed on Kirkus. They liked her book too! Link here. (Which reminds me I haven’t put up my own review of Shona’s book now that it’s hit the print edition of the Historical Novels Review and I can put it up on my own website—so look for that next week.)
F. Here’s a provocative list: 50 essential historical fiction novels. The suggestions in the comments are as interesting as the post. From Abebooks. This list has such clear classics as War and Peace combined with newer books. Hmmm. A lot missing, methinks. Choosing 50 might be impossible for me. Link here
G.
On the importance of historical novels. A post by Eliot Pattison on Janet Rudolph’s Mystery Fanfare blog. I think he ignores much of the engaging history that is currently being written, but his point that historical novels bring more life to history is still legit. Link here
H. Map of Odysseus’s journey. I’ve always been slightly leery of the notion that one can chart this mythic journey in the real world, but it’s an interesting endeavor and indeed there may once have been a real journey that we now hear through the filter of more fantastical storytelling. Certainly Homer was the first fantasy “writer” (singer?). Link here
Very interesting links, Judith! On the essential historicals, I know this was one person’s opinion. I could have dropped many from the list and added more than dropped. As for historical non-fiction, there is much that is engaging. As a former bureaucrat, I knew not to use in-house language in letters to the public so see little reason not to entice people outside the field into it with story-telling skills. But Pattison did make a good point about the frequent failure of history classes to make that link between us and our ancestors. Could go on but will stop with that!
I agree completely, Priscilla. Some of my favorites were missing from the list, but such things are so very subjective. And there are many sins of omission in the teaching of history that we’re all paying for as a society, but some bright spots also. As with most human things, it’s a mixture.
Hey Judith – I like the post but Homer was a long way from being the first such! Even if you assume that he was located close in time to the events – say the end of the Late Bronze, c. 1200BCE in round figures – you can go back much farther than him. There’s a lot of early 2nd mill stuff from Egypt (eg The Tale of Sinuhe). From Mesopotamia, whoever first wrote down Gilgamesh is a lot earlier still. Homer was a great guy (or girl, or school…) but was a long way from being the first!
Hi Richard–I’ll gladly grant you that Gilgamesh is earlier as are other traditions. From the modern fantasy writer’s view Homer seems pretty “first” feeling, so I got carried away.
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