Preface I:

Kay published these as Book One (1998) and Book Two (2000), but I would argue they are one story in two volumes, not a story and a sequel. I hadn’t realized there were two and came to the end of Sailing to Sarantium and thought, “What? That’s it?” It’s much more like the non-trilogy The Lord of the Rings, which is really one story broken into three parts, primarily due to limitations on binding all of that into one massive book. So, for The Sarantium Mosaic, like LOTR, you need to read both volumes.

Preface II:

I’m learning that my brain has a difficult time with historical fantasy. Reading regular fantasy, I just roll with whatever the writer gives me. With historical fantasy it takes about 100 pages for my brain to settle down and stop searching for the real historical connections. Is it just me?

The first book I read by Kay was Tigana, apparently his most acclaimed work. Set in an Italian Renaissance-like context, I came to it with zero knowledge of the political context he’d used as his model, but still couldn’t shut down the loud semi-conscious static of trying to align it with something “real”. I also wasn’t crazy about the story. It did not move me the way it obviously affected so many thousands of readers. (Goodreads: 4.08 stars w/52,000+ ratings!)

However, being fascinated with Byzantine history and finding so few novels in that context, I committed to reading the Byzantine-like Sailing to Sarantium and Lord of Emperors, even with my doubts.

Comments:

I finished the first book a year or two ago. The premise and characters were fantastical enough, and the context generic and micro enough that I didn’t have a lot of mental distraction. The structure was a journey, character’s meeting each other along the way and developing relationships within the hardships of travel and change. There wasn’t sufficient direct involvement with macro issues to make my subconscious go in search of connections. Then came what felt like an unresolved ending.

I just finished the second volume. Here I did struggle to quiet the background noise of wanting to attach characters and plot to what I know of Emperor Justinian’s period, (see my last post) especially now that the story was set in Sarantium (the stand-in for Constantinople). I did finally come to an equilibrium: oh, he is like him, she is like her, but also this one is like her, and none of them are really like the historical people and the plot is definitely not anything like what happened… oof.

By then, I’d read about 75% of the two volumes. There were so many people, so many plotlines, all so—Byzantine (there, I said it)—that I wasn’t sure who the protagonist was, who I was supposed to care most for. However, the characters were well-constructed, and since I will slog through a lot just to stay adjacent to things Byzantine, I pushed on.

Midway through this volume, the pace suddenly ramped up. First, a night of partner-swapping. I guess there were plot and character reasons for all of that, but it didn’t feel like it. I could go back and have a closer look at the web of relationships, but I’m convinced most of that was unnecessary, came out of nowhere, and stretched plausibility even in a fantasy world. It all felt “dangerous”, but why?

However, from that point, the story runs headlong into an intense series of events, full of twists to the very end. So, the last 25% is unputdownable. There is the main story climax, a strong “final complication”, and a long denouement that wraps up with more surprises.

Now if I were twenty years old, I’d consider going back to the beginning to read everything again. There would be a lot of dopamine hits from recognizing the setups, the connections, and understanding more of what was happening along the way. On the first read, it’s such a tangled mass, it’s hard to follow every thread. A second read would be like a treasure hunt.

These are popular and successful books. (4.2 and 4.3 stars with 15-17K ratings on Goodreads). But my TBR pile is way too high for a second read. I must move on.

Have any of you read The Sarantine Mosaic? I’d be super interested to know if you had a similar experience. Also, do you read much historical fantasy? If so, do you struggle to relax into the story? Do your thoughts go on their own quest like mine? I love the idea of historical fantasy and never have any trouble reading stories around King Arthur tales, but for some reason other historical fantasy does a number on my brain.

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Thanks for reading!

Lausanne

It’s been several months since I finished reading The Book of Saladin, the second book in Tariq Ali’s Islam Quintet. I read the first, Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree, back in 2014 and wrote about it the following year. (I’ve just pulled that blog post over to my Substack feed so you can now read it here.)

Having had a meh response to the first, why would I move to the second 11 years later?

Because these are stories I want to love: set off the beaten path, with points of view from regular folks, those who have to navigate the world in which they have so little direct effect on the bigger events. Not the rulers, but those who must survive the vicissitudes of those in power.

Coincidentally, this story, like The Secret Chord, is structured as a telling from one commissioned to record the life of another. Saladin’s life story is told from the point of view of Isaac bin Yakub, a Jewish scribe who spends decades in the Arab camps observing and recording the anticipation of the Saracens’ recapture of Jerusalem, its aftermath, and the various hangers-on in Saladin’s orbit: his nephews, another scribe, a favorite wife, etc.

As with Natan in The Secret Chord, the narrator Isaac has his own concerns and trials, but the focus is on the mover and shaker—Saladin. The narrator is not the main character.

There were times I nearly put this book down. When we’re immersed in the crusade periods, we have come to expect sweeping movements and action, large-scale drama. The Book of Saladin is constructed as years of close character studies. Even so, the most developed characters were the others: a feisty wife, a flamboyant advisor. Saladin, ironically, felt the most distant—more described than experienced.

I am glad I finished it, but while the characters have some unique qualities, I didn’t come away feeling like I “know” any of them, even the narrator. Had it been set in a time and place either too common or that holds little interest to me, I likely would have drifted away and not returned.

I crave stories in these less common settings and points of view, but both of these (The Book of Saladin and Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree) lack a sense of immersion. The characters are interesting, but I can’t say I found them intriguing or people I grew to care much for.

I will keep trying; there are five books in the series. I’ll have to read more than one every 10 years though, because I won’t last THAT long.

Meanwhile, our temporary move is DONE.

The house has hit the market and swiftly creating a buzz. It is an iconic structure in the neighborhood and has enchanting features inside and out.

What’s next for us? The day after we turned the house over to the realtor, I started writing scenes for Book II. Finally under way!

I hope you are all well and have dug out from under any winter storms, or are surviving peak summer heat—for those of you on the other side!

Many blessings to you all!

Lausanne

The following was written in March, 2015 and originally published on my WordPress blog Long Ago & Far Away.

While working long hours last Fall, I slowly made my way through Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree by Tariq Ali. Set in 15th Century Spain, a family of Muslim landowners cope with Ferdinand and Isabella’s Reconquista.

I am always excited to read a tale from Long Ago & Far Away. Unfortunately, this one was a struggle.

SPOILER ALERT!

For the first half of the book, it was difficult to know which character was the protagonist. Most of this portion is backstory, or story-within-story. Who am I supposed to care about? I nearly put it down but hung in there because of what I had already invested. I love books set in other cultures, and I accept that the target audience might be more accustomed to the slower pace. So, thinking it could just be me, and not wanting to miss out, I slogged on.

Then things got more interesting and focused on two characters.

Then everyone died.

Except one fellow.

And the whole thing felt like a setup for the next phase of his life. A sequel?

The book is part of the Islam Quintet—a series by Mr. Ali. But the next book is not a sequel. It’s a story about Saladin—who is not a part of Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree. As far as I can tell, we don’t ever get back to this story.

The problem is structure and focus. I love the idea of the book, but it meanders and then ends. Clearly, Mr. Ali wants us to care about the loss of a centuries-old culture. But it’s the lives of people that draw readers in, and I couldn’t care about anyone because the story is everywhere at once and therefore emotionally nowhere.

I wanted so much to love it. I may be willing to try the others in the series simply because I want them to be good.

You can read Amazon reviews here.

And Goodread reviews here.

You can read my more recent comments on Book II of the Islam Quintet here.

I’ve noted before that I write few true book reviews. I am more interested in the connections between stories. As they simmer in my brain, I’m often struck by similarities that are less obvious at first glance. Of course, my own lens affects what I see—colored by the ideas meandering through my soul at that moment. So, for what it’s worth, here’s where these two recent reads converge for me.

Shared Themes:

The Secret Chord, by Geraldine Brooks, traces the life of King David in the 10^th century BC. Silence, by Shusaku Endo, follows the odyssey of a Portuguese Jesuit missionary in 17^th-century Japan. Brooks and Endo’s characters inhabit grim and gritty worlds, unsparing in their brutality and subjugation. Their stories examine the raw humanity, trials, and obsessions of men whom we might, from our tidy armchairs, judge as abject moral or spiritual failures. The distance in time and geography is bridged by questions of grace—that unmerited favor—and how we experience it while still walking in the consequences of our fallenness: when there are no answers, when Providence feels absent, and when God has seemingly nothing to say while we endure the day-in-day-out doubt and uncertainty.

The Secret Chord:

Most of us know the story of David, at least as far as Goliath is concerned, and possibly something of his faithfulness and resistance to King Saul as Saul descended into madness. But once made king, David’s story is blighted by a crisis of character. His unbridled lust leads to adultery (rape, if we consider whether Bathsheba had any choice in the matter) and murder.

The resulting generational chaos and strife drive David’s family into rebellion, incestuous rape, and fratricide.

In The Secret Chord, we see all of this through the efforts of Natan, as he compiles a biography of David, at the king’s request. Natan, the prophet of God, strives to advise and direct the king, making it clear that David must reap the consequences for his sin for decades to come. Natan provides a compassionate yet objective narrative of David’s victories and failings, contrasting the horrors with the beauty of David’s repentance and longing for God and the bright light of grace and redemption implied in the rise of young Solomon.

Silence:

In Silence, Portuguese Jesuit Sebastião Rodrigues arrives in 17^th-century Japan driven to understand the rumored apostasy of his previous mentor, Cristóvão Ferreira. Cristóvão has disappeared, leaving a trail of clues—a mystery that Sebastião must solve. Through journal-like letters chronicling his tale, we witness Sebastião’s inner turmoil and gradual understanding of the one who has gone before him, while contending for his own faith under brutal persecution.

I’ll withhold any more of the plot as it is an edge-of-your-seat spiritual suspense that could be too easily spoiled. However, it follows a similar theme of failure and judgment and questions of grace when God seemingly withholds all presence, guidance, and relief.

Shared Structure:

We walk through these stories with Natan and Sebastião, uncovering the lives of David and Cristóvão. Natan interviews those who have known David since childhood to understand the king’s beginnings. Sebastião searches for answers about Cristóvão’s fate, seeking any and all who might help him grasp the circumstances and causes of the unimaginable. The narrative forms of biography and letters add layers of telling that provide distance from the immediate events. This structure introduces an element of observation and interiority that is presented and interpreted about another and for another. As such, these stories demonstrate the complexities of understanding and portraying God’s work in others as well as ourselves. They resonate without providing superficial answers to our experience of grace.

This narrative distance, this one-step-removed filter, is a structure I am planning for a difficult book I have outlined. In mine, the driving character, like David, is a shadowy historical figure so complex that I feel the need to tell her story through the eyes of an observer rather than from her direct point of view.

As with Natan and Sebastião, my point-of-view character will need her own story interlaced with the true main character’s. I hope by doing so to explore this multi-layered approach to how we perceive and affect the outworking of grace in each other.

Before attempting this level of storytelling, I need to absorb more successful tales using this structure.

Have you read other novels that use this narrative distance? How were the main character and point-of-view characters’ stories woven together? Why might the writer have chosen to do so?

Long time readers may recognized this title from a newsletter I sent after reading this novel via Substack:

Now I have the print version and, wow, is it gorgeous!

Here’s J.M. Elliot’s site wherein she discusses the book’s release with a video trailer:

J. M. Elliott

Of Wind and Wolves is available for preorder

Plus, The Steppe Saga: Book One Trailer…

Listen now

8 months ago · 14 likes · 20 comments · J. M. Elliott

If you’re looking for a story set in a context you’ve likely never encountered before, you won’t be disappointed.

Whatever novels I read back to back, no matter how disparate, my brain goes into a compare/contrast mode. I’m often surprised by the connections, so I offer them to you in a non-academic ramble.

Cloud Cuckoo Land, Anthony Doerr, 2021: historical, contemporary, and futuristic. Set in Ancient Greece, 16^th-century Constantinople, 20 & 21st-century US, UK, Korea, and Mission Year 65, Space Ship Argos. 3^rd person, present tense.

It took some work to find the structural rhythm: six point-of-view characters, four general time periods, and those with multiple internal shifts, tied together by a fictional lost & found manuscript of an ancient Greek novel. Whew! I enjoyed the AD 1453 siege storylines and the futurist plot the most. That’s no surprise. I’m typically less enamored with more recent periods.

The central motif of the Greek manuscript is a fun connection with the historical writer Antonius Diogenes’ The Wonders Beyond Thule—tying this imaginative tale to an imaginative writer of ancient fiction. Just the sort of thing we HF readers enjoy.

But my main driver for reading through it was pure curiosity: how is he going to pull off this clever convergence of timelines?

I appreciated the risky creativity despite the sci-fi tipping into (spoiler)1

I balked a little at the questionable climax of the contemporary storyline (spoiler)2

I’ve twice tried to read Doerr’s Pulitzer Prize Winner, All the Light We Cannot See, (Nazi occupied Paris), and can’t get past the opening. More proof that subject matter is key to my attention.

This one I enjoyed, but he had me at “Constantinople”.

Now, for the unlikely companion piece:

Girl with a Pearl Earring, Tracey Chevalier, 1999: historical fiction. Set in 1660s, Holland. 1^st person, past tense.

I’m a late-comer to this long-term genre favorite,3 but I fell easily into the single point of view, straight-forward storytelling. About half-way through, I had a sudden fear it would become a gothic romance. Rest assured. It does not. The context of Vermeer’s household and the imagined daily life of the artist and our heroine’s navigation of her unique dilemma raises the story above the usual maid/master-of-the-house power dynamic.

Striking Commonalities:

With such structural differences, I was surprised at the similarities beyond the historical fiction genre.

Both are tightly character focused. Although Cuckoo involves so many, every rendering is a study of inner-workings and behavioral cause and effect. Doerr covers them in 600+ pages, so there is plenty of scope for examining each. In 230 pages, Chevalier explores her single point of view in depth, while her character weighs and studies those around her.

We also encounter the “orphan” and “coming of age” tropes. Of Doerr’s six POV characters, we have five coming of age and at least four are orphans. Chevalier’s MC is not technically an orphan but she is very much set apart from the safety of her own family. Her coming of age is played out in the careful suspense of the plot.

Surprisingly for the genre, neither novel makes narrative effort to describe the wider context of their worlds. They are immersion-via-character, not world-building. We are simply embedded, experiencing their experiences.

Doerr does not explain the Byzantine/Turk conflict that engulfs his 16^th-century people. We learn nothing of the politics of the Korean War. We see only key moments of life in a prison camp. Doerr hints at why the futuristic society has committed less than 100 volunteers to a 592-year space mission, but does not elaborate. We are limited to the point of view characters’ understanding and what little they know of the circumstances engulfing them.

Chevalier gives us little of 17^th-century Holland outside this two-year sequence of events in one household.

In both, we navigate the personal, environmental, social, and emotional landscapes directly.

Both conclude with what are essentially afterwards—fast forwards to descriptions of the central characters’ adult futures, lessons learned, distanced maturity. They provide a sigh of relief, but I wonder if they were necessary or even undo some of the dramatic tension that would otherwise have lingered over these stories.

And so, here we have two vastly different structures and yet laser focus on the direct experience of the characters.

You can conclude by my writing this summary that I finished them, which these days means I enjoyed them. I recently abandoned yet another novel after 37 pages of world-building. Like many historical fiction readers, it is the time/place that draws me. (see above re: my rejection of Doerr’s Pulitzer Prize winner). And I can take a lot more of the larger context than these novels provided, but it must be woven into the challenges and concerns of intriguing people.

Even if I am interested in the period, don’t make me wait for the story.

To go further, I’d get into spoilers, so I’ll stop here. Have you read either of these? What did you think?

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First, a confession: I did not finish this book. And yet, it is an immersive, eye-opening, gob-smacking sensory experience. If you've ever wondered what pre-Flagler Florida was like, here's your chance. No highfalutin gilded lilies in sight.

I can’t confirm Patrick Smith's research, but the book gets fantastic reviews, even forty years after publication.

Events in 1968 frame the story, but the plot begins in the 1868 palmetto and swamp of central Florida, a day or so from the St. John's River. It soon moves further south, settling on the Kissimmee where this family of three spends decades trying to survive with little more than their hands. Bandits, bears, fires, and hurricanes frequently destroy years of work in their scrubland wilderness.

Early on, the Confederate Army conscripts Tobais, the father, to drive feral cattle north to the Georgia line. Doing so teaches him the skills to set his family on a path that will consume the rest of the book. He earns the whip to become a true cracker.

Did you know that by the mid-1800s, many tens of thousands of wild cattle roamed the inland prairies and wetlands of Florida?

Since I don't read about books before I dive in, I thought this multi-generational family saga—crackers to tycoons—would be more evenly distributed, but after about a third of the story, I flipped ahead and found the tycoon years are tacked onto the end. I decided I'd had enough of the play-by-play hard scrabble, cattle-driving, land-clearing, and citrus-planting, so I bailed.

But that doesn't mean you would.

Have any of you read this one? Tempted?

Personal Stuff:

I’ll have a Work in Progress update soon. In the studio, I’m still ironing out some technical issues, but happy to be in there when I can. Planted some herbs. That’ll be it for gardening. I have a goal to clear out the last climate control storage unit this year. They jacked up the rate by 30% overnight. I’m done with that nonsense!

Hubs’ backyard hive threw off three swarms this week. None of them chose the prepared swarm catchers for their new homes. Whaaa! After the third, he checked the hive to see if there was a problem. Turned out they were building a brood comb in an odd location, somewhat boxing themselves in. He’s made some adjustments and they’ll have to figure it out from there.

I hope you’re all well. Any new endeavors as the season turns?

Blessings!

Lausanne

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I’ve finally finished all five books. I’m not sure what year I read Pillars of the Earth, but, yeah, it’s been a while. Amazon says 4600 pages between them. So my specific responses to each are too distant for any in-depth commentary, but I will address them in the order I read them.

1. Pillars of the Earth—was first published in 1989. (What?!). I’m sure I didn’t read it until about the time of the eight-part mini-series in 2010. Don’t hate me. I haven’t seen the films, and I did not much enjoy this book. I stuck with it because I needed to understand what the hoopla was about, and I was less likely to abandon books back then. Besides, it’s hard to find novels set in the twelfth century. The issue for me was: I did not fall in love with any of the characters. I felt the common thread of building the cathedral was weak. It wasn’t horrible. It was just meh.

2. World Without End—2007—Set in the 14th century, I so wanted to love this material that I committed to giving it another chance. I found this one more engaging, more characters I cared for.

3. The Evening and the Morning—2020—The prequel. Something about it turned things around for me. Reaching farther back in history (10^th century) is always a hook for my brain, but I also felt more connection to the characters. I cared more. The macro period was fascinating.

4. A Column of Fire—2017—This one I truly enjoyed. Set in the 16^th century during Elizabeth’s ascension, consolidation, and reign, I found these characters the most well developed, the micro and macro plots entwined. I wrote about it HERE. I was impressed with how Follett navigated the challenge of the religious divide, something I must grapple with in my WIP. I also thought these villains, although awful, were more interesting. I would not call them sympathetic, but they were human. (See the next one…)

5. The Armor of Light—2023—I can’t say I disliked it, but the story’s focus is scattered. I had to ask myself, what is it about? The social effects of new technology? The Napoleonic War? These storylines run alongside the narrative, but are not really central to the plot. The plot is loosely tied by the characters all being from Kingsbridge and involved in the textile industry. It follows the events of their lives through many decades of trials (real and figurative) and change. Who is the main protagonist? I guess we’d call it an ensemble. There are several duplicated motifs: men longing for married women, women dissatisfied with their unpleasant husbands, the resulting inevitable affairs. The most disappointing are the cringey one-dimensional villains. There are many likeable characters with satisfying internal arcs. However, the most dramatic is that of a minor character. It takes place off page and is explained after the fact. Pity. It might have been one of the best to explore.

General Observations:

As for all fiction, a reader’s response to the characters is key, but I notice I will forgive a lot if I am fascinated by the time and place, immersed in a captivating world. Of course, that’s why I read HistFic.

The long gaps between books give me hope.

Oh, no. Wait. He wrote at least 15 other books over that same time-span. Sigh…

Okay, have I appalled you? Are you throwing your popcorn at me?

What aspects of a story will keep you reading even when you’re not completely enchanted?

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My plan to review the list and let you know of any stories matching the Long Ago and Far Away ethos was thwarted by—The List. Nothing to see here. Unless you count the ‘80s & ‘90s. And I’m not prepared to go there. I remember way too much of that stuff.

Pity because I usually find the International List more interesting than the English language one. Nevermind. Here’s their Substack/Website if you would like to see the pickins’:

The Booker Prizes

The longlist for the International Booker Prize 2025 is announced!

The longlist for this year’s International Booker Prize, which celebrates the best works of long-form fiction or collections of short stories translated into English, is announced today…

Read more

a year ago · 323 likes · 31 comments · The Booker Prizes

Meanwhile, I’ve finished Follett’s Kingsbridge Series. Whew! (How many years? Thousands of pages?) I will comment on those soon.

I’ve also just abandoned a remarkable Hist Fic novel. I’ll tell you all about that too.

So, on to the next one. I hope I like it. Lots of potential. But I only read a page of his Pulitzer before passing on it. And so… Golly, I’m getting hard to please!

Have you read any captivating Historical Fiction recently? What about other fiction? What’s on your TBR pile?

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I like to scan the big prizes to see how well historical fiction is represented in the ethos. This year, of the thirteen novels on the Longlist, a whopping FIVE are historical! This makes me happy, happy!

The Booker Prize is “awarded to what is, in the opinion of the judges, the best sustained work of fiction written in English and published in the UK and Ireland.”

Here are the historical fiction titles on the Longlist:

Held, by Anne Michaels: 1917, WWI, France and North Yorkshire, covers four decades in the life of a wounded soldier.

Wandering Stars, by Tommy Orange: Begins 1865 at the Sand Creek Massacre (Colorado) and continues into the 21^st century.

This Strange Eventful History, by Claire Messud: Begins in 1940 Paris and moves on to North Africa, the Americas, and Australia.

James, by Percival Everett: 1861, Mississippi River – this is a retelling of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the point of view of Jim, the runaway slave.

The Safekeep, by Yael van der Wouden: Mid-twentieth Century Dutch.

The shortlist will be announced on September 16^th; the winner on November 12^th.

I’ve linked to the Booker Prize pages for each. Let us know if any of these interest you. If you’ve read any from the list, tell us what you think!

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The last two novels I read had an unplanned historical continuity.

The first, Ken Follett’s A Column of Fire, runs from 1558 to 1606 during which the House of Tudor was fending off the House of Stuart, both before and throughout the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. I chipped away at this tome while getting my head sorted out from personal events.

I then, somewhat randomly, picked up The Rose and the Thistle at the library. I was scanning Christian novels, looking for ways to integrate literary quotes and paraphrases into my own work. I figured most Christian fiction would make various forms of reference to and integration of scripture. Although Ms. Frantz’s book is a romance, something I rarely read, I liked the cover. I checked the Amazon reviews: 4.6 stars out of 614 reviews. It looked like a good resource from a pro.

Until I began reading, I didn’t realize The Rose and the Thistle is set in 1715 in the context of the House of Hanover putting down the last Jacobite efforts to restore the House of Stuart—still at it over 100 years after Follett’s A Column of Fire ends.

So, here was a surprising historical overlap between two vastly different stories.

A little Compare/Contrast for you:

Both, of course, are set in the context of Catholic vs. Protestant conflict.

Ken Follett’s A Column of Fire (Viking 2017) is listed as Book 3 of 5 in his Knightsbridge series, although this is chronologically book #4 if you count the prequel: The Evening and the Morning.

A Column of Fire follows the life of Ned Willard, spy for Queen Elizabeth, as he works to put her on the throne and then keep her there. He has two personified antagonists, 1) Rollo Fitzgerald, the brother of his first love—a financially ruined Catholic turned monk/spy supporting the Stuarts, the Spanish invasion, and the Gunpowder Plot, 2) Pierre Aumande, a blood-thirsty scoundrel supporting the Guise family’s efforts to retain power in France. It also traces the two women in Ned’s life, one Catholic, one Protestant, both courageous in their beliefs and actions.

The story swirls between England, Scotland, France, the Caribbean, etc. It encompasses the French religious wars, the long imprisonment of Mary Queen of Scots and her eventual execution, the failure of the Spanish armada, all the way up the Gunpowder Plot.

This plot is world history personalized.

• A complex story tracking big history through the lives of powers behind the powers.

• Covering a nearly 50 year scope.

• Many point of view characters.

• Scrappy regular people shaping big events.

Laura Frantz’s The Rose and the Thistle (Revell 2023) is a classic clean historical romance: sharp-witted damsel made dependent upon the bachelor lord of a large estate. In this case, Lady Blythe Hedley, a Catholic and only daughter of the Duke of Northumbria, is cast upon the charity of Everard, Earl of Wedderburn, a Scottish Protestant and retired military hero. While her father works to support the Jacobite (Stuart) Rising, her host must try to honor his own father’s promise made to the duke—to protect Blythe from the consequences of her father’s clandestine activities. The story takes place between Northumbria and various sites in Scotland.

This plot is tight and personal, set against historical events.

• The larger history undergirds the plot, but these characters are not driving these events. They are trying to navigate currents they cannot direct.

• The narrow focus allows for more immersive experience in the physical world of the story.

• Having only two point of view characters allows for more in-depth exposure to their internal workings and emotions.

• The entire story takes place within a few months.

I would say I preferred Follett’s broader historical scope, it’s more my kind of story, although at the character level, those in my Work in Progress are more like Ms. Frantz’s—trying to survive the sweeping events they have little personal control over.

As noted, I rarely read romance—too predictable, I suppose, but I enjoyed this one. I read Ms. Frantz’s book quickly. She writes beautifully without bogging the story down with too much froufrou.

I balked a little at a certain plot point, but won’t spoil that here.

I also felt the romantic tension would have worked better if she’d kept the story to Bylthe’s point of view rather than including Everard’s (as did Ms. Austen in Pride and Prejudice).

Suspense can work two ways, 1) the reader not knowing anything more than that of the main character, sharing their ignorance—Oh, no! What’s behind that door? or 2) the reader knowing more than the POV character and wanting to scream at them—Don’t go in the basement! As it was, I felt I wanted to smack Bylthe for being a dullard where Everard was concerned. If I hadn’t known his POV, I might have been more convinced of hers.

But these are minor observations in an otherwise elegantly written text.

And, yes, this text answered most of my style/formatting questions on how to integrate references to other literature in fiction. She even includes multiple Shakespearean quotes, which will help me find ways to finesse Ovid and Homer into the minds and dialog of my characters.

Overall, both books get a solid recommendation from me. The juxtaposition of the two is an exciting reminder of the endless potential for historical fiction.

Have you read either of these novels? If so, what did you think? If not, do they interest you? What’s the best fiction you’ve read recently?

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Just a quick note from me today.

I've set myself an every-other-week publishing goal, so this newsletter is unofficial. :) I could not wait until next week to alert you to a fabulous podcast I listened to recently.

On How I Write David Perell interviews Amor Towles, plumbing his writing wisdom for a solid hour and a quarter. You'll most likely know Mr. Towles from his most acclaimed works:

Rules of Civility

A Gentleman in Moscow

The Lincoln Highway

Of these, I confess, I have only read the first, as recently as last year. It is brilliant. (I have some catching up to do.)

In the podcast, you will learn about Towles' process, his thoughts on craft such as writing descriptions through the eyes of point of view characters, and his sense of responsibility to his readers. At the end, he waxes on about the unique attributes of New York City as a melting pot of passions.

Towles also notes an upcoming short story/novella collection, Table for Two, due out on April 2, 2024, currently on pre-order from Amazon.

Here’s the Apple Podcast link.

I found it on my regular podcast catcher so you should be able to search for it of you use other than Apple. The How I Write podcast website does not have this episode updated yet. It was aired on 2/14/24.

In writing this, I see there’s a YouTube version of the interview.

If you listen to/view the podcast, I'd love to know if you enjoy it as much as I did.

Until next week,

Lausanne

Just a quick note today. As I've mentioned, I'm planning to send this newsletter every two weeks to keep my focus on the Work in Progress. However, this morning, when taking a break from a new research slog, I refreshed my podcast player and discovered the latest episode of Writing Excuses features an interview with Abraham Verghese, the writer of The Covenant of Water. In it Verghese talks about the challenge of making his story’s medical details true to life while not overwhelming the reader; trying to see these details through the eyes of the characters rather than from his own medical experience, and the challenges of translating insider knowledge for the reader—when to explain terminology and when to allow the context to show the meaning. 

(Apparently, I’m not the only reader who skipped some of the medical parts!)

I was encouraged to hear that his first novel took eight years to write. The Covenant of Water took fourteen.

Anyway, there’s much of interest in the discussion, so I wanted to provide you all with a link to the Writing Excuses podcast.

If you are a writer and are not aware of Writing Excuses, you need to check it out. It's been around since February 2008 (!wow!). I think I’ve been listening since 2012 when I finally started writing. It has always focused on craft and so has been a major resource for me over these years.

Since I'm here, about that Work in Progress research: I've finished working through the scenes of my two primary characters (Alex and Mariam). On 1/1/24, I started my review of the next character in the line-up. Oy. So much still to flesh out for this one. It is requiring a return to the source material to clarify and strengthen some still-too-vague ideas. I need to keep the pressure on this guy through the long-haul of the story. So, this feels like a screeching halt, but that's what I'm working on.

I hope you are all having a sparkling start to 2024!

I'm about two-thirds of the way through a strange little book: Perfume (Patrick Suskind, 1985). The story is set in 18th-century France. It was recommended as an excellent study of how to evoke the sense of smell in writing.

As usual, I had no idea what I was getting into. I was soon reminded of another book: The Tin Drum (Gunter Grass, 1959). I did not enjoy The Tin Drum. In fact, back in the day when I/we felt it a personal failure to abandon a book once started, I gave The Tin Drum several hundred pages, then cast it aside.

Perfume, like The Tin Drum, is a dark, absurd tale with an unlikeable, no, repellant protagonist. After a few pages, I paused my reading to take a closer look and found that, like The Tin Drum, Perfume was translated from German. I know nothing of German literary history, but have to wonder if there was any conscious connection—probably some genre I am ignorant of. Thankfully, Perfume is a short book—only 255 pages, compared with The Tin Drum's 600. But both books were produced as films—Perfume in 2006, and The Tin Drum in 1979, winning the 1980 Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. So what do I know?

But that’s not why we are here.

We're here to have a look at how Patrick Suskind gets maximal effect, making words evoke the sensory detail of smell.

So far, I've found five categories of techniques:

1) I'll call this “description by naming the source”, or, shall we say—by nouns:

"In the period of which we speak, there reigned in the cities as stench barely conceivable to us modern men and women. The streets stank of manure, the courtyards of urine, the stairwells stank of moldering wood and rat droppings, the kitchens of spoiled cabbage and mutton fat; the unaired parlors stank of stale dust, the bedrooms of greasy sheets, damp featherbeds, and the pungently sweet aroma of chamber pots. The stench of sulfur rose from the chimneys, the stench of caustic lyes from the tanneries..." (p. 2-3)

That's half of the paragraph.

So here we have straightforward references to exactly WHAT it is that is causing the odor. It's not a description of the odor. The reader understands through reference to personal experience.

2) I'll call this one “description by simile”:

“…even the king himself stank, stank like a rank lion, and the queen like an old goat.” (p. 4)

3) By metaphor:

"Thousands upon thousands of odors formed an invisible gruel that filled the street ravines…" (p. 33)

4) By adjective:

"It was fresh, but not frenetic. It was floral, without being unctuous. It possessed depth, a splendid, abiding, voluptuous, rich brown depth—and yet was not in the least excessive or bombastic." (p. 60)

5) By effect:

"The scent was so heavenly fine that tears welled into Baldini's eyes... Baldini closed his eyes and watched as the most sublime memories were awakened within him. He saw himself as a young man walking through the evening gardens of Naples; he saw himself laying in the arms of a woman with dark curly hair and saw the silhouette of a bouquet of roses on the windowsill as the night wind passed by...” (p. 85)

What I find surprising is that Suskind’s most common technique, by far, is the first. I would have thought simile and metaphor would dominate in such an obviously “literary” novel. Here we are, trying to work up some clever metaphor, while Suskind lets the reader’s direct knowledge do the job. He names things and our brains take over.

Of the five, I find the last the most intriguing, least exploited, and hardest to pull off. If I smell boxwoods, I am transported to the entry of my grandmother’s house. It is a jolt, a nearly physical displacement back to that exact location. No other scent has as strong an effect on me. I’d love to develop the writing skill to use scent as a memory trigger for characters.

Coincidentally, just today, after writing this newsletter, including the boxwood reference, I was sorting old family slides for scanning. Lo-and-behold, there’s an image of Grandmary in her yellow Easter dress, hat, and gloves, in front of her stoop, flanked by those boxwoods—circa 1968. Priceless.

When I finish reading Perfume, I’ll let you know my response to the story itself. There’s really only one big plot question, and it seems impossible that Suskind can bring this all back around to the answer, but we trust that he will, and that suspense alone keeps us in this nightmare.

In the meantime, do you know of any other writers who excel in the smell category?

Leave a comment

I try to discuss books without giving away spoilers because, for me, they deflate some of the magic. I don’t even read the back matter and certainly not reviews before reading a novel. I want the story to unfold exactly the way the author planned it. As a writer, I work hard to reveal each facet at just the right moment, so as a reader, I only want to know the genre, time, and place when I start at the opening line.

I’d be interested in what you all think about this issue. How do you write about a story without spoiling something? Or is it not important to you? Do you like to know what you’re getting into first? How much is too much?

I’ve also noted elsewhere that I do not write standard reviews. Rather than plot summaries, I prefer to zero in on particular story elements, craft observations, themes, or questions raised. There are plenty of places to find reviews and I will list several for The Covenant of Water at the bottom of this article.1

With those caveats, I’ll start with what you really want to know: Yes, I would recommend this novel. Absolutely, yes. As historical fiction, it succeeds in captivating, horizon-expanding, question-raising storytelling.

But brace yourself. Verghese pulls no punches. He spares his characters nothing, and as in real life, there is rarely any warning.

Not only is his storytelling an emotional whipsaw, but Verghese is a professor at the Stanford University School of Medicine and brings all of his medical acumen to the page.

It took me a while to read this novel, not because it is 700+ pages long. I had to set it aside for days at a time to recover my courage to go on.

But the horrors bind together the complex plot and are embedded in the deep points of view of well-crafted characters.

This 20th-century story is set among the St. Thomas Christians of Kerala who trace their conversion to the AD 52 journey of Thomas the Apostle to India. This context alone is enough to get my attention. I’ve long been aware of these St. Thomas Christians, Christian history being a particular interest, but I knew little about them. And since exploring new cultures is the major draw of historical fiction for me, I am a fitting audience for The Covenant of Water.

Beginning in 1900, Verghese follows three generations of one family against the background of world wars, independence, and communist uprisings. Verghese keeps most of this larger context at bay, instead focusing on the personal trials of the individuals.

I was relieved when the atrocities of The Partition were glossed over. Apparently, that human experiment, costing one million lives, took place at a distance from Kerala. That’s not to minimize the importance of those events, but the ordeals in Verghese’s character’s lives were exhausting enough for one book.

What held me through the trauma was Verghese’s compassionate construction of his characters—and there are a LOT of them. We see the inner workings of their thoughts, rationalizations, fears, beliefs, and sometimes flawed decision processes. Even minor characters appear deeply layered with the impression of full histories outside the bounds of this story.

There were times I doubted Verghese could bring all the disparate plotlines together, but I persevered in the trust that he would do so because of his strong debut, Cutting for Stone, and the generally enthusiastic reception of Covenant. And, of course, he did just that—skillfully bringing together the paths of three generations through the eighty-year saga.

Now I turn to the most obvious theme of the novel: Faith in The Covenant of Water.

I’ll make just a few observations, as it could be its own project. After roughing in my thoughts for this article, I searched out some reviews to post at the end and noticed many mention the theme of “faith”, but none discuss it further. “Faith” gets a cursory, even canned reference, and no more. And yet the salvation imagery of water—the death, the burial, and resurrection pictured in baptism—are all here and not subtle. References to cleansing, new life, water’s changeless and ever-changing nature, and its power to move landscapes—the literal and figurative—abound in the text.

In 1900, the future matriarch, Big Ammachi, is a child bride who leans on a settled faith to navigate her new husband and responsibilities. She retains a rooted Christian belief and allegiance through the many decades of her life, through all her family’s troubles. Until her death, whether in the foreground or background of the unfolding plot, Big Ammachi is a pillar of character and prayer. When she sees her own flaws, she asks God’s forgiveness. When she suffers, she turns toward her God, although, like Job, she would appreciate it if God would pay a little less attention to her family.

As time moves forward, the second and third generations embody modernity and the accompanying technological sophistication and social changes that come with it. These generations gradually discount their faith. When they suffer, they move toward doubt. In the end, they find a tenuous peace and resignation in their own self-atoning sacrificial acts of love.

This is where I stumble. Does modern life and our increased scientific worldview negate the need for faith? Has Progress solved any of these characters’ real problems of behavior or choices? Is the rejection of the spiritual, the Other, necessarily universal and inevitable in the age of science and medicine, or is the result a greater despair when science and medicine still fail?

In Vergheses’s story, one medical issue is solved but another is not. And for these characters specifically, the writer is certainly aware of the irony that their magnanimous actions model God’s redeeming sacrifice. Is sacrificial love now only to be found in human behavior?

Despite their scars, Verghese’s characters come off squeaky clean in their repentance and savior-less atonement. They experience absolution by the writer. It’s beautiful but a bit rose-colored. Through their personal refiner’s fires, everyone is self-redeeming in the end. It’s all a bit joyless in its humanistic dead end.

I would argue that it is not inevitable that modernity must exclude faith. If anything, the twentieth and twenty-first centuries have displayed more reason to look to the Model of sacrificial and redeeming love for answers. Otherwise, we are left with an untrustworthy humanism at the expense of the sacred.

I know we can’t read them all, but we can surely try!

The following Long Ago & Far Away novels are either on my radar or already sitting in the physical or digital To Be Read stacks of my life.

The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng – the highly anticipated latest work by the writer of The Garden of Evening Mists and The Gift of Rain was published last week in the US. (It had an earlier release in the UK). As with the other two, The House of Doors is set in Penang, Malaysia. It is Eng’s third novel to make the Booker Longlist.

Lady Tan's Circle of Women by Lisa Lee – This novel by the writer of Snow Flower and the Secret Fan and Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane was inspired by a true story of a woman physician in 15^th-century China.

River Sing Me Home by Eleanor Shearer – Set in 1834 Barbados, the Emancipation Act has freed Rachel but she remains essentially enslaved as an unwilling apprentice. Rather than serve another six years, she sets out to find her five surviving children who were sold during her life as a slave. The journey takes her through the rivers and forests of British Guiana and as far as Trinidad in search of her family.

Wilbur Smith’s posthumous publication released by his estate, Nemesis: A Novel of the French Revolution, begins in Paris but like most of Smith’s epic adventures, this novel of revenge spans from Cape Town to Calcutta.

Elizabeth Chadwick’s The King’s Jewel is burning up my Kindle demanding attention. Set in 12th-century Wales it traces a young woman’s transition from a hostage concubine, to a forced marriage and political intrigue.

And, of course, The Armor of Light, #5 in Ken Follett’s Kingsbridge Series. #4, A Column of Fire, is on my pile of hardbacks waiting to be read.

Must. Catch. Up!

All these calling me, but I am only halfway through The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese. Set in early 20th-century India, this sweeping story immerses you in the land through the lives of many disparate point-of-view characters as Verghese orchestrates the unlikely convergences of their stories. I don’t yet know where it will end, but I can tell you, Verghese knows how to throw his characters into the deep end. His medical background is on full display and I’m glad I’ve spent the last 25 years married into a medical family. It has prepared me, somewhat, for the detail and specificity of conditions and procedures his doctor characters encounter or perform on a regular basis. This is not for the squeamish but it certainly transports you to another time and place.

As for my Work in Progress: I have set a publishing goal but I’m not going to tell you the date — it’s still so far off that you might give up on me if you know it. And yet, it will take an aggressive commitment to get ‘er done by then. But I am at the point where finishing is within the realm of the possible so, I’ve set a date and marked out the interim goals. Now to be sure to take my days off from the Day Job and put them to good use.

Are you currently reading any Long Ago & Far Away?

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Last month I read two historical novels available for free on Substack. Both were serialized as chapters sent to readers’ email inboxes via the authors’ newsletters. They are available now in completed form on the writers’ Substack sites, The Library, and the writers’ other websites.

For my comments on When Trees Fall by Dale Mahfood, see last week's article here.

Today I present the second of the two—Of Wind and Wolves by J.M. Elliot, the writer of The Problematic Pen and one of two writers maintaining the marvelous site mentioned in last week’s article, The Library.

As you know, my historical fiction interests are wide but lean heavily toward times and places less frequently encountered on the buying shelves. J.M. Elliot’s Of Wind and Wolves is set in the 5^th century BC, on the Ukrainian steppe, and inspired by a passage from The Histories of Herodotus. Of course, that grabbed my immediate attention.

Within a few sentences, I submerged into Elliot’s fluid prose, transported to the world of her main character, Anaiti.

Anaiti, the daughter of an Amazon woman, raised among her mother's nomadic people, is also the daughter of a Bastarnai king—a settled and farming tribe who distrusts her Amazon heritage.

As her story begins, she is already a multi-cultured creature, but through a marriage agreement must now live among the Skythians—more wild and nomadic than her mother’s people, but just as distrustful of her Amazon identity as the Bastarnai.

Thus she arrives in her new world, but circumstances soon drive her to an even more remote and violent life than the secluded tent of a husband-king. To delay her marriage, she chooses to travel with her host’s Warband, a border patrol who roams the farthest reaches of the territories, addressing threats along the frontier before these threats encroach Skythian lands.

This is a path where deprivation and violence are the norm, a land where courage, loyalty, and brutality are a daily matter of life and death.

In this context, Anaiti must navigate the intricacies of existing relationships and establish her own allies within the fighting unit as together they battle against the invasion of other peoples. As time passes, her bonds to the land and to her war leader increase the stakes of her impending future as the third wife of an elderly king. To spend her life confined in a tent and entangled with tribal politics rather than roaming the wilderness on the back of a horse becomes more untenable.

J.M. Elliot’s text enchants like the endless steppe she portrays. Anaiti’s worldview grows alongside ours as she learns to thrive in this hostile yet majestic land and people.

Of Wind and Wolves is described as Volume One of The Steppe Saga and ends on an “Oh, no!” So, I hope Ms. Eliot is off somewhere scribbling the next volume.

Of Wind and Wolves can be found here complete with map and backmatter describing some of her extensive research.

Historical fiction, the way I love it, opens up new worlds. In Of Wind and Wolves, you can experience the vast landscape, feel the biting cold, and ride horseback through rivers and snow from the safety of your own home.

This story is glorious but not for the faint of heart.

Have you read anything set in the Long Ago & Far Away recently?

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In the past few months, I have read two long-form historical novels available for free on Substack. This week, I want to tell you about the first of them: When Trees Fall by Dale Mahfood the writer of .

Next week, I will introduce you to the second remarkable find, Of Wind and Wolves by .

When Trees Fall (Dale Mahfood) is set in seaside Jamaica during the anxieties of the Second World War, but at a geographical distance from its horrors and the Jamaicans’ British colonizers. Jamaica is on the cusp of change, but no one knows exactly how to navigate it. Into this background, Dale Mahfood immerses the reader in the critical turnings of his three main characters.

We are anxious with Catlin, the daughter of a wealthy landowner as she transforms from tomboy to young woman, self-conscious of her changes in interest and grappling with her first experience of heartbreak. We feel the anger of young Archie, the mixed-race son of a single mother, as he struggles with his identity and growing independence into a self-determining young man. We grieve with Sharpe, the newly appointed estate foreman, as he seeks vengeance in dark powers, stumbling between the paths of justice and mercy. A series of letters from the past intersperse the chapters, gradually filling out the context for the reader and the story’s three point-of-view characters.  Along the way, each faces answers to questions they might have rather left undiscovered.

Through it all, Dale weaves their crises together while pulling the reader further into their world and worldview. This setting was a time and place I knew nothing of yet Dale presented it in full dimension. I became increasingly invested in the external and internal outcomes of each character. They took on an existence in my thoughts between readings.

I met Dale early in my Substack efforts, thrilled to find a like-minded writer. He was born in Jamaica and so brings a fresh authenticity to his story. When Trees Fall is Book One of his Wood and Water Saga. He has committed 10% of the sales profits from this book to Food for the Poor, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to "help the materially poor and to renew the poor in spirit" in seventeen Caribbean and Latin American countries.

When Trees Fall is available for free on Substack as a “serialized novel”. You can find it here with sequential links to each chapter as a separate Substack post. Or, you can buy it on Amazon here.

Many readers of this newsletter are writers who inhabit the strange and growing world of Substack as fellow newsletter creators. Others of you are writers and readers who may not be aware of Substack’s offerings beyond noticing that some of the emails you receive, whether on writing, politics, culture, or any old thing, have Substack links embedded here and there. Others of you have likely not even noticed Substack’s entry into your inbox because Substack’s basic format is intentionally clean and simple.

When I first signed in to Substack online, I was surprised to find that I already had an Inbox with a dozen or so newsletters in my feed. These were from people and organizations I had found elsewhere. I had signed up for their emails, neither knowing nor caring that their platform was Substack.

What fewer people know is that there is a growing number of fiction writers gathering here.

And, in order for writers and readers to find each other, two generous Substackers have created a separate newsletter/Substack site called, The Library.

The Library

Welcome to The Library

This is The Library, where readers can check out all the best books Substack has to offer. Search for and find your next great read here! The Library is exactly what it sounds like. Well, sort of. With so many writers publishing full-length works of fiction here on Substack, as well as nonfiction works like biographies and memoirs, it became clear that r…

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4 years ago · 86 likes

In this library, you can find fiction that has been uploaded to Substack under genre categories such as Science Fiction, Romance, Fantasy, Literary, and, of course, Historical. Many of these stories are free. Some are only available to paying subscribers of that writer’s newsletter. Some are also published as ebooks and/or print books and available for purchase elsewhere, such as writers’ direct sales websites, Amazon, Bookshop.org, etc.

It was in The Library that I found the two full-length novels noted above. When Trees Fall by Dale Mafhood, and Of Wind and Wolves by J.M. Elliott, another marvelous telling of Long Ago & Far Away.

Have you read any fiction on Substack yet? Are you planning to publish fiction on Substack?

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Water for Elephants

Last October, my mother’s unexpected death brought my caregiving days to a sudden end. Much of that time is still holy ground, but I want to share an experience I believe my readers may value.

While in the midst of giving care to a parent who brought you into the world and supported you through your own trials, you may find yourself desperate for God’s wisdom and convinced you can only fail.

The tables are turned. Rather than guiding you to independence—learning to eat, learning to walk, getting your driver’s license, finding your way in love and heartbreak and vocations and life decisions, you must guide them through down-sizing, passing of friends and family, lost freedoms, lost authority, lost identity, removed driver’s licenses, forgetting how to walk, even how to eat. All the while, you despair of your ability to do it right, to fix everything.

But wisdom often comes from unlikely sources.

Some years before my caregiving days became all-consuming, I read the book, Water for Elephants (Sara Gruen). Set in the 1930s, it follows a traveling circus and the behind-the-scenes lives of its performers and animal handlers. In truth, I did not much like the book. I found it an unremarkable love triangle placed in a circus context. I wasn’t convinced all the drama was worth it.

However, Water for Elephants is set in a frame story. In the frame, ninety-three-year-old Jacob is living out his last days in a nursing home. Jacob retells the central tale of his youth, the circus, his love, and the events leading up to a catastrophic stampede.

In Jacob’s present day, a circus has come to town and Jacob is determined to see it, if it’s the last thing he does. His family and caregivers are too busy to take him and, of course, he cannot go on his own because they are responsible for him and fear it will be the last thing he does.

It is this frame story that made an immediate and lasting impression on me. It sent up flashing lights. Not circus lights. Warning lights.

For all the caregivers’ genuine concern, Jacob was still capable of self-direction, of decision-making, and needed to be allowed to remain so despite his limitations, despite the inconvenience.

That truth became the grace of God for me during the years I strove to keep one or the other of my parents safe. It became a constant reminder I could not live their lives for them and they had the right to make every decision that they could for themselves.

When overseeing your parents’ care, you can't corral them into a playpen or send them to their room while you cook their special food. You can't sweep them up and set them on your hip when they fall. Sometimes you've got to call your husband home from work while you sit there on the floor with them, pillows stuffed under their head and other points of stress, and wait. That, or you call the paramedics.

The fact is, you are their overseer. To care-give means standardizing and systematizing. The fierce temptation is to become controlling. By the end, my parents depended upon me for everything. If you can control everything, you think you might survive. But you can battle the medical system, the insurance system, the caregivers’ schedules, and still you cannot control what’s happening in their bodies, in their souls. You can’t. You must let go, and you must allow them every act of volition short of setting the house on fire—from refusing cancer treatment to having ice cream for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, because if you don't, what's the point? They are still self-determining people, or else they are prisoners you are warehousing. What you can do is give them every opportunity to make their own choices.

My father’s passing took a long road, his suffering greater for it. But one of the last things he did before he fell into his final six-day sleep was to elbow me aside, and I loved him for it. He was himself to the end. To elbow someone aside was 100% uncharacteristic of him, but it was the one thing he could do right then to assert his will over a small matter of getting nourishment down him. He was never a controlling man, but he had an unshakable character and this simple act showed me that he was still very much with us, he would self-determine what he could, and I needed to stand back from it.

In the middle of it all, I remembered Jacob, his determination to have a say in what meant everything to him, whatever the risk. It was his risk to take, his choice of how to live. He needed to be allowed to go and see the circus.

This fictional frame story became a guide, a reference, a boundary, reminding me that my parents deserved their freedom to direct their lives.

I don't know what I would have done differently had I not read Water for Elephants beforehand. I might have understood these things myself, but I believe it would have come more slowly, with more damage and frustration in the daily battle of changing needs. Jacob was a lighthouse to turn to whenever I lost my way.

West with Giraffes

The days since Mom’s passing have not been what I might have imagined. They have not been a sigh of relief. There has been awe at the surreal presence of God in her last month of life, deep thanksgiving that her suffering was limited and short, and gut-punching shock at her disappearance.

Some months after my mother passed, as if to create its own frame story, I stumbled into reading West with Giraffes (Lynda Rutledge). This book is also set within a frame. Again, the present day’s main character is an ancient fellow living his last days in a nursing home. Woodrow Wilson Nickel’s goal is to write the story of his 1938 adventure as a seventeen-year-old Dust Bowl refugee destined to drive two young giraffes from NYC to their new home in the San Diego Zoo. At 105 years old, Woodrow will risk his last breath to get this character-forming episode of his life down on paper for posterity. To the dismay of his caregivers, who want him to rest and eat, he drives his own course. He finishes the manuscript just before his passing.

When your life was knit with the moments of final care, your grieving process has the added layer of second-guessing. Did you protect them enough? Did you make the best decisions? Did you fight hard enough?

West with Giraffes was a gift of solace, a reminder that my parents fought their own battles and fought them with dignity, surrounded by love, but walking their singular paths to the grace of God.

Imagine reading West with Giraffes while grieving my mother, who, just like Woodrow, kept writing her fifty-year project, drove it to conclusion, through the pain and the painkillers, and finished the most critical draft only four days before the fall, the delirium, the ER, the hospice and Home.

On the other side of caregiving, Woodrow reminded me that my parents were themselves to the very end. You can wonder and doubt and wish you had done this or that, but to the last moment, it is their life.

Sometimes doing your best means opening your hands and letting them live, even in their deaths.

Many books are forgotten. Others affect us, stay with us for reasons the writer never anticipated. Water for Elephants and West with Giraffes share many similarities: the period, captive African animals, the restless souls of the humans caring for them, and the end-of-life challenges of their frame stories. And each is a testimony to the power of fiction to challenge us and mold our empathy as we journey onward with our fellow creatures.

You may notice that I do not write typical book reviews. Formal reviews do not interest me as a writer. (As a reader, yes!) Instead, I tend to find connections between books or zero in on specific aspects of a work. I’d rather leave the formal reviews to others.

I recommend Water for Elephants primarily for the impact of the frame story. You can find reviews for Water for Elephants here. You can also purchase the book here.

I recommend West with Giraffs with love and enthusiasm for every word. You can find reviews for West with Giraffs here. You can also purchase the book here.

Next week I plan to post another excerpt from my Work in Progress. I am currently reading a selection of historical fiction works published here on Substack and am looking forward to sharing them with you soon!

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My passions—tea and historical fiction (not opium!) collide in the following two books:

For All the Tea in China – How England Stole the World’s Favorite Drink and Changed History – by Sarah Rose – Non-fiction

And,

Sea of Poppies – by Amitav Ghosh – Fiction

I had chosen the tea history because of my general love for the drink and growing curiosity about its history and transport.

Sea of Poppies was on my radar because of my constant search for historical fiction set off the beaten path, especially stories by non-Western writers.

So, what do these books have in common?

Colonialism, international trade, the early effects of globalism, and personalizing these broad concepts in the lives of individuals.

Specifically, they deal with two of the three sides of the East India Company’s trading triangle: producing opium in India, trading opium for tea in China, and transporting tea across the world to the exploding tea market in Britain.

For All the Tea in China tracks 19th-century botanist Robert Fortune’s efforts to steal tens of thousands of tea plants and seeds from China and set up a competitive market in the Himalayas—all to profit the East India Company.

I have long loved Victorian travelogues. I used to scour the shelves at McKay’s in Knoxville for every dusty book pertaining to Central Asia and the Great Game. Sarah Rose’s summation of Fortune’s journey makes me want to read his writings for myself. However, in these journals, we rarely see the consequences these “intrepid adventurers” had on the local populations, either as individuals or as communities.

Fortune’s book, A Resident Among the Chinese: Inland, on the Coast, and at Sea is available on Archive.org. The front matter lists another by the same author: Two Visits to the Tea Countries of China and the British Tea Plantations in the Himalaya. If you would like to read his own account of his industrial espionage, have a look.

NPR’s 2010 post and audio file of their interview with Ms. Rose can be found here.

Sea of Poppies – This historical novel presents both Indian and colonists’ points of view, showing us the trauma of the populace whose subsistence farms were turned into poppy fields. Over time, the farmers’ indebtedness to the Company forced many into impoverished dependency and some to emigrate as indentured servants. The story traces the experience of multiple characters, including Deeti, a widowed and destitute farmer’s wife who contracts herself to a labor broker. On a sailing ship bound for Mauritius, she joins the others, a mismatched, endearing cast of individuals.

Amitav Ghosh followed Sea of Poppies with River of Smoke and Flood of Fire to complete the Ibis Trilogy.

You can read the Amazon reviews for For All the Tea in China – How England Stole the World’s Favorite Drink and Changed History – by Sarah Rose – Non-fiction – here. You can find the Bookshop.org page here.

And,

You can read the Amazon reviews for Sea of Poppies – by Amitav Ghosh – Fiction – here. You can find the Bookshop.org page here.

Did you know about the 19th-century industrial theft of the tea industry? (I sure didn’t before reading For All the Tea…)

Have you read any Victorian travelogues? (I still love them, but the worldview is pretty cringe.)

What about Amitav Ghosh’s fiction?

Let me know in the comments!

And for now, I need another cuppa…

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