Recommendations for good How To Write Historical Romance book, please

I'd avoid a how-to strictly about romance, and focus on historical research itself. The historical authors I know of are all sticklers for in-depth research on the things that defined their chosen eras. It's more work for the author up front, but when well-done the results are brilliant.

Step one: find your era, location, and relevant social class(es). Step two: find who knows about it. Step three: pick their brain, archives, or contact list. Repeat as necessary. There are thousands of online archives. Municipal and university libraries will often have specific archives that might involve your field of interest. Moreover, historical specialists are usually happy to share their knowledge, provided they are approached in a respectful, professional manner.

Yes on everything but the whisky (you might run into someone who abstains.)

The trick is narrowing down your interests enough that you can begin with Wikipedia and use those sources as stepping stones. Wiki is great, but it's a start. If you live near a major university or big-city library, you can budget in parking and photocopy fees and spend the day there.

I'm also certain I've seen amazing historical research blogs by AWers, but I don't know which time period you want. Time for Google-Fu, Pisco!

Pisco Sour, if your historical period is post printed books and pre 1923, try The Internet Archive. They are trying to scan all books that are out of copyright.

Try the uni archives and libraries in the cities near you, they might save you the petrol and time into town.

Also take a look at medieval reenactment groups and museums that cover that time period.

Pisco Sour said:

. ..; I've reached a point where I'd like to read more about historical detail, accuracy and suchlike.

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A History of Everyday Life in Medieval Scotland. Here.
Look through the bibliography of the book to find other related works and the original sources.

There's endless information about the history of Scotland. General works about everyday life in the Middle Ages are also probably useful.

Pisco Sour said:

. As well as anything I can about the sub-genre!

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The subgenre being Medieval Scottish Historical Romance?

Maybe look at here and maybe here and here.

^^ Listen to job. She is our resident goddess of all things historical!

Cathy C said:

Listen to job.

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*g* I am so not an expert on Medieval and Scotland.
However, my googlefu is strong.

I wanted to say Dorothy Dunnett and Outlander, but those are both way late.

Job's links are so golden I bookmarked 'em. Good luck, Pisco!

Joseph & Frances Gies wrote some excellent books on medieval life. The titles make them seem kind of simplistic, but they're really much more detailed than that.

There are also books covering specific topics within a period, which often have lots of fun stuff you can use to add some verisimilitude. Like MEDIEVAL COOKERY AND CEREMONY or MEDIEVAL COSTUME IN ENGLAND AND FRANCE.

It's also worth looking at things like castle websites, which often include historical info or links to same, or sites devoted to famous people of the period (frex, the Richard III Society). Written biographies of those people, or books about specific events, are often useful, too. (Personally, though, I'd avoid anything by Alison Weir; I find her biased and inaccurate, and inclined to gloss over things or make unfounded logical leaps.)

Diana Gabaldon's Outlandish Companion isn't exactly a "how to" so much as a "how I do it". Unless you've read her books it might not make too much sense because it's quite series-specific, but I've found it interesting just to see the process she used in her earlier stuff. And honestly, unless you count the mid-late 20th century "historical", I'm not writing historical romance. But it still shares some of the same tasks/qualities. (And it's amazing how much research I'm having to do with a story set in the nineteen-eighties. I mean...I lived there. But the details...eep.)