Review | What We Left Behind by Robin Talley

What We Left Behind

by Robin Talley

My Rating: 

Toni and Gretchen are the couple everyone envied in high school. They've been together forever. They never fight. They're deeply, hopelessly in love. When they separate for their first year at college—Toni to Harvard and Gretchen to NYU—they're sure they'll be fine. Where other long-distance relationships have fallen apart, their relationship will surely thrive.

The reality of being apart, however, is a lot different than they expected. As Toni, who identifies as genderqueer, falls in with a group of transgender upperclassmen and immediately finds a sense of belonging that has always been missing, Gretchen struggles to remember who she is outside their relationship.

While Toni worries that Gretchen, who is not trans, just won't understand what is going on, Gretchen begins to wonder where she fits in Toni's life. As distance and Toni's shifting gender identity begins to wear on their relationship, the couple must decide—have they grown apart for good, or is love enough to keep them together?

I received an eARC of What We Left Behind from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review - thanks to MIRAInk and NetGalley for letting me read this book early!

Check out my review of Robin Talley's debut, Lies We Tell Ourselves, here.

Last month I read Robin Talley's debut novel, Lies We Tell Ourselves, and with her third novel, As I Descended, being one of my most anticipated reads of 2016, I think it's safe to say that Talley is an author I've been keeping my eye on, so I was thrilled when my request to receive an eARC was approved.

Sadly, I didn't love this one. In fact I struggled to finish it.

Something that really excited me about this book is the inclusion of a genderqueer protagonist. Before now I hadn't read a single book with a protagonist who identified as genderqueer, and it's so important that people who identify as such are given a voice in literature just as much as any other member of the LGBT+ community. Now the first thing I must say is that I am cisgender and, as such, my reading experience with this book is probably very different to someone who identifies as genderqueer - in other words, people who identify as genderqueer will know a lot more about the representation of gender fluidity than I do, so please keep that in mind when reading my review. If you identify as genderqueer and haven't read this book yet, it could be that my opinion of it doesn't help you to decide whether you should read it or not. Okay? Okay.

There is a lot of discussion about sexuality and gender in this book. I love that. Sexuality and gender need to be discussed more, and lately, in YA in particular, I've seen a lot of LGBT+ representation, which I think is fantastic. Having said that, there were times when this novel felt more like a piece of non-fiction; it was as though Talley was simply using Tony (I will be using 'Tony' and 'he/his' pronouns throughout this review) as a puppet through which she could discuss all the thoughts about gender that are bopping about in her brain.

I'm sorry to say that Tony got on my nerves, too. He doesn't have a great home life, and for that I completely sympathised with him, but there were times when he was just so selfish. It's important for us to have stories like this one about people who are trying to figure themselves out - I think we spend our whole lives constructing and deconstructing ourselves - but Tony is so concerned with his own self-discovery that he forgets the people around him are people with their own hopes, dreams and fears. He assumes Gretchen is just going to follow him everywhere and do whatever he wants, and yet he refuses to explain his worries to her because he doesn't think she'll understand. Then he accuses her of not understanding. I also didn't appreciate his jealous streak, or his pretentiousness; at first he doesn't like to use gendered pronouns, which is totally his call to make, but he never considers how not using pronouns for other people might make them feel. Some people feel uncomfortable when gendered pronouns aren't used for them, and it's hypocritical of Tony to demand something for himself he's not willing to do for others.

I wasn't keen on Tony's thoughts concerning heterosexual women, either; two of his roommates are pretty horrible, but he thinks they don't count as feminists simply because they like to 'conform to gender stereotypes'. It was almost as thought anyone outside the LGBT+ community wasn't worth his time, and I didn't like that.

The person I hated most in this novel, though, was Gretchen's 'best friend' Carroll. Despite being a gay man from a very homophobic background, and therefore knowing what it was like to feel belittled and anxious because of his sexuality, he was incredibly rude to other members of the LGBT+ community. He was particularly rude to Gretchen when talking about Tony - the guy had some serious transphobia going on and it really bugged me that Gretchen never told him where he could shove his frankly disgusting opinions. I spent most of the novel hoping he'd get hit by a bus.

I appreciate what Talley was trying to do with this story, I just didn't feel it; it didn't move me in the same way Lies We Tell Ourselves did, and I wasn't too keen on the insinuation throughout the novel that people who identify as genderqueer simply haven't decided whether they're male, female or non-binary yet. It's almost like saying that someone who is bisexual hasn't decided if they're gay or straight yet. I don't think that is Talley's view - and one thing I did appreciate is that neither of her protagonists are perfect, not by a long-shot - but it still came across that way and it made me uncomfortable.

So I didn't love this, and I'm disappointed that I didn't love this, but I'm still looking forward to reading more of Talley's work, because I think we need more authors like her who are willing to tackle subjects like this one.

I'm going to leave a link to Layla @ The Midnight Garden's review here, because she felt very similarly to me about the book and managed to phrase everything far more eloquently than I have!

Review | Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli

Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda

by Becky Albertalli

My Rating:

 

Sixteen-year-old and not-so-openly gay Simon Spier prefers to save his drama for the school musical. But when an email falls into the wrong hands, his secret is at risk of being thrust into the spotlight. Now Simon is actually being blackmailed: if he doesn’t play wingman for class clown Martin, his sexual identity will become everyone’s business. Worse, the privacy of Blue, the pen name of the boy he’s been emailing, will be compromised.

With some messy dynamics emerging in his once tight-knit group of friends, and his email correspondence with Blue growing more flirtatious every day, Simon’s junior year has suddenly gotten all kinds of complicated. Now, change-averse Simon has to find a way to step out of his comfort zone before he’s pushed out—without alienating his friends, compromising himself, or fumbling a shot at happiness with the most confusing, adorable guy he’s never met.

YA contemporary is one of the genres I tend to read the least of - the majority of the books I read nowadays aren't YA and I'm much more inclined towards the speculative than the 'normal' - but every now and then I stray back into the genre, and I almost always enjoy it when I do. This instance was no different.

I've heard nothing but praise for Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda, so when I saw the kindle edition was relatively cheap I bought a copy and if I hadn't started reading it in the late hours, with work the next morning, I easily could have read it in one sitting; I read it for about an hour before I went to sleep and breezed through almost a third of it. I finished it the next day. I flew through this book, it's so much fun and surprisingly funny; as in 'I-actually-laughed-while-reading-this-and-got-weird-looks-from-my-family' funny.

This is one of those YA books where the characters feel like real teenagers. Some of the characters in this book reminded me of some of the people I went to school with, and as someone who so often finds it difficult to relate to the characters in contemporary YA this made for such a wonderfully nostalgic reading experience. I knew my fair share of Abbys, Taylors and Martins when I was at school.

Simon is a fantastic protagonist. He's funny and adorable and also genuine; he feels like a real boy (no that's not a Pinocchio reference) and the way he reacts to the pretty horrible situation he finds himself in is perfectly realistic. Considering she's a (presumably) heterosexual woman, Becky Albertalli has written a young gay man very well. I loved his relationship with Blue, too; the two of them have electric, honest chemistry and their emails were heartwarming, heartwrenching and hilarious all at once. Even though Blue was a little frustrating at times, he was never unlikeable, and even though I guessed who Blue was just over half way through it didn't take anything away from the ultimate reveal.

This isn't the best book I've ever read, but it was an incredibly pleasant surprise. I was glad that characters like Martin and Leah didn't get their ideal happy endings in a romantic sense because the two of them still have some growing to do; both of them were pretty shitty towards Abby, and what Martin does to Simon is, quite frankly, horrific. Blackmailing someone by threatening to out them is disrespectful and dangerous; some people don't come out because they don't feel safe in doing so, and Martin never even considers that.

All in all it was a fabulously entertaining book that I loved from start to finish and couldn't put down - 5 stars from me!

Review | Lies We Tell Ourselves by Robin Talley

Lies We Tell Ourselves

by Robin Talley

My Rating: 

In 1959 Virginia, the lives of two girls on opposite sides of the battle for civil rights will be changed forever.

Sarah Dunbar is one of the first black students to attend the previously all-white Jefferson High School. An honors student at her old school, she is put into remedial classes, spit on and tormented daily.

Linda Hairston is the daughter of one of the town's most vocal opponents of school integration. She has been taught all her life that the races should be kept separate but equal.

Forced to work together on a school project, Sarah and Linda must confront harsh truths about race, power and how they really feel about one another.

Somehow Robin Talley has completely passed me by, though considering I don't read much YA nowadays I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised. It's not even that I don't read YA out of choice, I've just been drawn to a lot more adult fiction this year. I wanted to check out some of Robin's work after I discovered As I Descended, which is one of my most anticipated releases of 2016, and then I stumbled across her debut novel, Lies We Tell Ourselves, and just had to read it.

I haven't read many books set during the '50s - if any - so it was refreshing to read about a time period I don't stray into that often; I love historical fiction, but I'm drawn to earlier history much more than modern history, mainly because of my lifelong love of the Tudors. I also very rarely read books in which racial issues are such a focal point; again, this is not something I do out of choice, but something that just kind of... happens. The only books I can pluck from the top of my head that deal directly with racial issues are Malorie Blackman's Noughts & Crosses and Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird and I've loved them both, so I guess that's proof that I should read more books like this one.

Lies We Tell Ourselves is difficult to read in the best kind of way. Does that make sense? The racism and abuse and outright cruelty that Sarah and her fellow black students, and the black population in general, face is sickening. It's awful to know that people were treated this way (and that, in some places, they still are) but stories like this one are so important. It's so important for us to remember the difficulties some people faced, and still face, purely because of the colour of their skin. I will never understand racism - I never want to understand racism - and I hope one day we'll see the day when colour no longer matters. If any of you think racism is a thing of the past, I implore you to open your eyes.

I really enjoyed Robin Talley's writing, particularly the sections in which Sarah thought about her relationship with God and whether or not God meant to make her feel the way she feels, whether the Bible says there's anything wrong with women loving other women, were so touching and beautifully written. To be honest I fell completely in love with Sarah - she's a wonderful heroine, and I just want to give her a hug.

This book also passed the Happy Lesbian Test - hooray! (If you're wondering what the hell I'm talking about, there's a trend in queer stories, whether they're in books, films, or on tv, where lesbian relationships almost always end in disaster. One of the women dies or they split up or one of them realises she's actually straight. It's bullshit.)

There were a few little niggles that meant I couldn't give the novel five stars. For me the ending seemed to wrap up very quickly; I was hoping for more of a climax, more of a 'BANG!'. Instead we were told a lot which was then never realised: for example, I was hoping for more of a confrontation between Linda and her awful father. I didn't want to see her getting hurt, but she seemed to get away from him very easily considering how hopeless she'd made her situation out to be, though I suppose a lot of Linda's issues were more insular than anything else.

I could also totally understand why Linda had feelings for Sarah, my little cherub, but I couldn't always understand why Sarah had feelings for Linda. I appreciated the idea that Sarah could argue with her and feel more like herself, and I really appreciated that Talley didn't write Linda as a super special snowflake who had none of her father's beliefs; she's had her father's views imposed on her all her life and people don't change their beliefs overnight. But she is racist. There's no denying that. Linda is racist and her racism gets people hurt. She does change her views - which is also an important message, because everyone makes mistakes and everyone deserves the opportunity to be given the time to develop and change their views; I said some stupid things when I was 18, too - but she is a racist when Sarah develops feelings for her, and though it wasn't entirely unbelievable I sometimes had a difficult time understanding why Sarah found her attractive in more than just a physical way when some of the things that came pouring out of her mouth were so ignorant and hurtful.

Ultimately, however, this is a brilliant debut novel and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I flew through it and I'm really looking forward to reading more of Talley's work!

How Do You See Cinder?

Yesterday during Top Ten Tuesday Cait @ Paper Fury asked a question about the ethnicity of Linh Cinder, heroine of The Lunar Chronicles, that got me thinking: is Cinder herself Asian or not?

I've said before how much I love The Lunar Chronicles, one of the many reasons being that it's one of the most diverse series I've ever come across. There are characters from all different ethnicities, four completely different heroines who are never pitted against one another, a leading heroine who's missing an arm and a leg and a 'Prince Charming' from Beijing. It's such a fantastic series.

Now I have to admit that upon first reading Cinder I didn't picture Cinder herself as Asian, though I didn't picture her as white either. Something about the way Marissa Meyer describes her made me picture her as Hispanic, though I have seen many people picture her as Asian.

But the more I thought about it, the more I thought: Why on earth would a group of rebels hide someone as important as Cinder in China if she was going to stick out like a sore thumb? Surely she was taken to China because she could blend in.

Does that mean she's Asian? Personally, the more I've thought about Cinder the more I've come to imagine her as mixed race and there are three reasons for this:

1) I'm not entirely sure that Levana and Channary are/were Asian (though I could be wrong!), but there's every chance that Cinder's biological father was. After all, Luna itself is brimming with all different kinds of ethnicities, so I imagine a lot of the population of Luna is made up of mixed race people anyway; Winter is also mixed race.

2) I always thought that Cinder not being Asian was something else that distanced her from her neighbours. Not only is she a cyborg, but she's also 'not from around here'. I'm not trying to imply that mixed race people are social outcasts, but even today some mixed race people face prejudice from both sides of their heritage.

An Anglo-Indian Harry, art by Brigid Vaughn

3) I love reading books with diverse characters - I've had more white protagonists than I've had hot dinners - but I think I've read even less mixed race protagonists. The only one that springs to mind straight away is Callie from Malorie Blackman's Noughts & Crosses series. I know there are some books that don't describe skin colour, leaving it open to the reader's imagination (recently there's been a lot of reimagining of Harry Potter as an Anglo-Indian character, which I love), but sometimes authors need to take it that step further and say 'This character isn't white. End of story.'

Why is this important? Because representation matters.

The people who disagree with that statement, and thankfully I've never met a single book blogger who disagrees with that statement, are also the kind of people who would immediately picture Cinder as white. So the people who do disagree with that statement also end up proving it to be true, because they picture Cinder as they are, regardless of the fact that she's described as having 'naturally tanned skin' and that she lives in China.

What are your thoughts? How do you see Cinder?

Thanks to Cait @ Paper Fury for inspiring me to write this post!

2015 Forgotten Histories Reading Challenge | Week 4

It's week three of the Forgotten Histories Reading Challenge, and this week's challenge is to read a book that is NOT set in Europe (including Britain) or North America.

Below are a list of books for any of you who are unsure as to which book to read. Don't forget to enter my giveaway!

The Narrow Road to the Deep North

by Richard Flanagan

The Timeless Land

by Eleanor Dark

The Lion Seeker

by Kenneth Bonert

Daughter of the Gods

by Stephanie Thornton

Theodosia and the Last Pharaoh

by R. L. LaFevers

Butterfly Swords

by Jeannie Lin

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan

by Lisa See

The Russian Concubine

by Kate Furnivall

The Last Queen of India

by Michelle Moran

Arauco

by John Caviglia

Happy Reading!

Seven Deadly Tropes

So Shannon over at It Starts at Midnight posted her Bookish Sins, and they were so much fun that I decided to share some of my own because, when it comes to books, I have quite a few pet peeves!

1) The Brooding/Unhealthy Love Interest

I know I probably sound like your mother, but that boy really is bad news! One of the main reasons I don't tend to read an awful lot of YA is because in my experience it's a genre brimming with these brooding, unsociable, horrible love interests. These are the kind of guys who, if you met them in real life, you'd probably want to stay as far away from as possible, and yet in book form they seem to make everyone swoon. There's nothing romantic about a guy who thinks the world owes him something and spends his days moping about how unfair the universe is, all while managing to look hella cute despite never cracking a smile.

This isn't something that's seen only in YA, of course. It's remarkable the amount of people who romanticise Heathcliff; those of you who have read Wuthering Heights will know there's nothing romantic about the guy at all. He's really quite awful.

Yeah, he totally looks like a guy you should date.

2) "I'm not like other girls!"

UGH. This is something else I often come across in YA: female characters who believe they're better than other women because they don't care about their appearance or because they spend their weekends reading all six of Jane Austen's novels. 

Shockingly women are as diverse as men; a girl can be a black belt in karate who enjoys playing video games and wearing makeup, just as another girl can enjoy shoe shopping and baking while also being a huge fan of the X-Men and Renaissance Literature. The worst thing writers can do - especially women writers - is pit different kinds of women against each other. It's just not cool.

3) The Dead Girl Test

Whenever I dip into crime fiction - which, unless it's historical crime, isn't all that often - there's always something I look for: does it pass the Dead Girl Test?

If you're wondering what the hell I'm talking about just go to the nearest shelf of crime fiction, whether you have an accumulation of it yourself or next time you're in a library or book store, and read a few of the blurbs. The majority of them will be about a police officer trying to catch someone who has been brutally murdering women.

Now that's not the part I have a problem with, but what does bother me is that you can guarantee that at some point there will be a scene in which a woman's body will be discovered and someone will describe how beautiful she is.

Firstly, dead bodies are grim. It doesn't matter if they've started decomposing or not, there's just something horrifying about corpses. No matter how pretty a person might have been when they were alive there is nothing to romanticise about their corpse. (In fact if your first thought upon seeing a dead body is 'hm not bad' then I think alarm bells should start ringing...)

Secondly, what I hate about this trope is that it implies that if the victim were as ugly as sin it wouldn't be as tragic. I know that's not what the author's saying, but I do think there's an element of that there and it really bugs me.

4) You've Got a Friend in Me

Again, this is something I tend to see a lot of in YA: whatever happened to girl/guy friendships? In recent years there have certainly been more, but so often if a boy and girl are best friends then at some point one falls in love with the other and it's so frustrating.

Friendships are so beautiful and powerful that a lot of the time romance can spoil them. Think of your friends - your best friends - if they were in peril you wouldn't even think before you helped them, would you? There's that old saying that 'friends are the family you choose', and I hate seeing friendships ruined for the sake of...

5) Three's A Crowd

If there is any hint that a book contains a love triangle then the likelihood is I won't bother reading it. I'm so bored of them, and in my experience they're done well very rarely. In YA nowadays love triangles tend to be made up of three things on my list; the brooding guy, the heroine who's not like other girls, and the best friend. So I think I'll pass.

6) Instalove

Does anyone actually like this?

7) It Matters if You're Black or White

I loathe whitewashing. I hate it in my films (I'm looking at you, Exodus) and I hate it on my book covers. If a character is a POC then it really shouldn't be difficult to put a POC on the cover if you're having people on the cover at all!

I wrote a post about this topic which you can check out here if you're interested in hearing more of my thoughts on this issue!

What are some of your bookish peeves? Don't forget to check out Shannon's post!

#WeNeedDiverseBooks | Whitewashing and YA

Before I say anything I'm going to say that these are just my personal thoughts. I am by no means an expert on racial issues and it's not my intention to insult or offend anyone, I'm just adding my own thoughts to the debate!

Over the weekend #WeNeedDiverseBooks trended on Twitter as authors, publishers, librarians and readers from all over the world talked about why diversity in literature - and in children's literature in particular - is important. You can find an article about it here!

So I thought today would be the perfect opportunity for me to talk about my thoughts concerning whitewashing and YA.

The majority of us, if asked, will say that we're not racist, and while I don't think most people who say that are lying it is possible to be racist without realising; especially if, like me, you're white. Most of us who are white don't tend to realise just how privileged we are.

I'm not trying to lecture anyone, and I'm certainly not trying to demonise white people. I'm a white person myself, and I think it's ridiculous to say that because someone's white they're therefore a horrible person, but I do think more of us need to realise just how underrepresented people of colour are.

YA today is fantastic at giving minorities - and I hate to use the word 'minorities' - a voice. Not only is YA well known for giving readers brilliant female characters who are more than just 'the love interest' or 'the sidekick', but many of these characters also happen to be people of colour.

So why haven't publishers and film makers noticed this?

Take The Hunger Games, for example. Katniss Everdeen is one of the best heroines to grace YA today; she's flawed, brave and loving. She's also olive-skinned, though the film franchise would have you believe otherwise. In fact fans of the series who only watch the films and don't read the books might have no idea that Katniss is a woman of colour at all.

Don't get me wrong, I love Jennifer Lawrence; I think she's fantastic as Katniss, but she is white. Other than Lawrence, several other actresses were considered for/interested in the role: Kaya Scodelario; Chloë Grace Moretz; Emma Roberts; Saoirse Ronan; Emily Browning and Shailene Woodley just to name a few.

Is it just me, or are all of those actresses white?

In her own words, author Suzanne Collins said: "In her remarkable audition piece, I watched Jennifer embody every essential quality necessary to play Katniss." (You can find the rest of that article here).

If the author's happy with the choice then I suppose the rest of us should be too. Collins knows Katniss better than any of us could ever hope to, and as I said before I do think Lawrence is a brilliant Katniss, but how do they know they wouldn't have found the qualities they were looking for in an olive-skinned actress if they didn't audition any?

Sadly it's not only the film industry that whitewashes its characters, the publishing industry does too; it's notorious for putting a white model on the cover of a book which features a non-white protagonist. Perhaps one of the most shocking examples of this is the cover of the first book in Julie Kagawa's Blood of Eden series, The Immortal Rules.

This series, set in a post-apocalyptic future where vampires roam the earth, features a heroine named Allison Sekemoto. If her surname isn't enough of a clue, Allison is Asian. Fantastic! I can't remember the last time I stumbled across a book with an Asian protagonist.

Hm. I don't know what's worse: that the cover designer didn't read the book and assumed the heroine was white, or that the cover designer did read the book and put a white model on the cover anyway.

(I have nothing against the model, of course, she's very pretty, I just don't think she's quite how readers picture Allison).

I wish I could say The Immortal Rules is the only example of a publisher choosing the wrong cover model, but sadly it happens a lot.

Let's look at Maria V. Snyder's Poison Study, the first book in her Study series. This particular series follows Yelena Zaltana, a young woman who is thrust from deathrow into a new job as the Commander of Ixia's food-taster. As far as Yelena knows she's an orphan from Sitia, the land that lies South of Ixia and is known for its magic-users and its warmer climate.

In the book it's mentioned that people from Sitia tend to have darker skin than those in Ixia, thus leaving Yelena's skin tone unspecified - meaning people can imagine her to be olive-skinned like Katniss or black like Malorie Blackman's Sephy in Noughts and Crosses - but one thing we know for certain is that she is not white.

And yet, once again, we are left with a white cover model. More than once.

Why are publishers so afraid of putting people of colour on the covers of their books? I refuse to believe that books featuring people of colour won't sell because there is an audience for books featuring such characters. Personally I don't care what the colour of the protagonists's skin is - I'll read anything! - and the majority of other readers I come across feel the same.

Representation matters, and both people of colour and white people should be on our book covers. The world is made up of so many different races that in this day and age it's ridiculous that we still think it a novelty to see people of colour in the media.

What are your thoughts on the matter?

J.

Why Write Historical Fiction?

I'm a huge lover of history and have been for as long as I can remember, but I knew many people in school who didn't see the point in learning about something that had already happened. This point of view always frustrated me, because not only does learning about history encourage us to make sure we never see anything like the Inquisition or the Holocaust again, but there is so much history out there for us still to learn.

We all know the phrase "history is written by the winners". Let's face facts: 99% of the time the winners have been white men, but what about everyone else? What about the women and the children and the people of colour? Where are the stories of the people who, sadly, make up 'the minority'?

Where are the stories about Ching Shih, the notorious Cantonese pirate who terrorised the seas in the early 19th century?

Where are the stories about Fatima al-Fihri, the woman who founded the world's first university in the 9th century?

Where are the stories about Bessie Coleman, who, in 1921, became the first African American to hold a pilot's license?

(I know all three of the examples I've given are women, rather than men, who aren't white - but did you know that March is Women's History Month?)

Historical Fiction is a medium through which writers can give a voice to those who have previously been mute.

That's not to say that the stories of white males should be discredited, but just as the world isn't made up entirely of white men now, nor was it made up entirely of them 1000 years ago. Historical Fiction gives us the chance to explore history through the eyes of a person whose story might not have been written down otherwise. Obviously fiction is fiction - we shouldn't believe everything we see written down, because some liberty always has to be taken when it comes to writing Historical Fiction - but more often than not the Historical Fiction writers I have come across have always tried to be as historically accurate as possible.

Historical Fiction gives a voice to the past in a way many non-fiction books don't. It makes these untouched stories readable in a way non-fiction often can't. And ultimately, as cheesy as it sounds, it makes history fun; especially for people who find it intimidating or uninteresting.

It can also be used as an explorative tool. Historical Fiction always does one of two things: say something different about the past, or use the past to say something different about the present.

We can use fiction to take readers back to Nazi Germany and say: "Look. This is what happens when hatred wins." Or we can take them back to the Spanish Inquisition and say: "This is why people should be left to believe, or not believe, in anything they want." Or we can take them back to France during the Revolution and say: "See? You do have a voice, and it does matter."

In an interview on the radio (which you can find here) Hilary Mantel said "history is not something that's behind us, it's something we move through", and I couldn't agree with her more. What people sometimes forget about history is that the people who lived in the past didn't know what was going to happen tomorrow, in the same way we have no idea where we're going to be next week.

We can look back now and say "what's the point in learning about WWI? We know who won." We do, but the people living through it had no idea what was going to become of them. That leaves storytellers with an infinite amount of inspiration.

Kings, Queens, Presidents, Dictators, Emperors, Pharaohs... They're more than just paintings, sculptures or names. They were people, just like you and I, and salt tasted just as bitter on their tongue as it does on ours.

This is why Historical Fiction is so important. It's not about bodice-ripping or adding "Ye Olde" to the front of every other word, it's about people, how those people sculpted the world we live in now, and why it's so important that they did.

J.