Is it historical if it didn't happen?

Wevermonic

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My novel is set in 1883 midwestern US. The town is made up, the landscape around the village is fiction (there's no lake similar to the one in the book in the state), and there's a massacre. There are historical references, and the culture during that time is the same. Am I overthinking this? I feel like I am categorizing this story wrongly. I don't know. I would hate to try to change all that because I feel like it adds to the story, but... I am scared.
 

Prophecies

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Plenty of historical fiction takes place in fictional places, such as The Book Thief (although there are def motifs to historical events). My advice is stick with your categorisation, maybe read some more in your genre. Good luck!
 

Lakey

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I'm not entirely sure what it is you're scared of -- is it that you are not allowed to call your story "historical fiction" if it's not novelizing real people and real events? Don't worry about it. That is one type of historical fiction, true -- but there are plenty of historial novels that tell stories of entirely fictional people, set in the past. Just to pick one modern example, the novels of Beatriz Williams do this, as do some of Kate Atkinson's. There are several of us here on AW whose projects are historical novels of this type. And there's nothing wrong with making up a fictional town in which to set your story, just as authors of contemporary fiction frequently do. Don't sweat it.

:e2coffee:
 

angeliz2k

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It's historical fiction. Historical fiction doesn't have to be about real historical figures and places, though it can be. Or it can be a combination: fictional people in a real place witnessing real events. Or the characters and the places can be entirely fictional, within the larger historical framework.

America's First Daughter is about the very real Patsy Jefferson. Real characters, real places, real events. That's historical fiction.

I just finished The Summer Before the War, about fictional characters in a fictionalized town doing fictional things. This is also historical fiction.

My most recent WIP is about real people in real places doing the things they really did. Previous WIPs were about entirely fictional people doing entirely fictional things in a fictional setting within the larger, very real context of the Antebellum South (the plantation and the people that populate it aren't real, but they could be).
 

benbenberi

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You're writing historical fiction, not history. In fiction, writers make stuff up. Writers of contemporary fiction invent imaginary people, places, and events all the time. Writers of historical fiction get to do that too. So your "problem" isn't a real problem at all. Go ahead and tell your story the way it wants to be told!
 

frimble3

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If it takes place in some recognizable period of time, about 'realistic' people, I say it's historical fiction.
If you're dealing with some small place, and unimportant people, as long as you're depicting things as they 'could be', you're good.
If you want to deal with well-documented places, and well-known people, you've got to do more research, because people will notice.

Queen Elizabeth I marries Prince Albert and has a dozen children, or you have elves, working magic, or Leonardo invents robots, you're in fantasy territory.
 

CWatts

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Somewhat related - what do y'all think about having little shout outs/Easter eggs in your historical fiction?
For example, I'm tempted to have my 19th century bohemians hang out at a cabaret with the same name as a rather notorious nightclub in 1980s/90s Richmond - the Jade Elephant.
 

angeliz2k

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Easter eggs are great. You might be the only one to get it, but that's okay. So long as it's not wildly out of place, it would probably go right over the heads of most readers. "Jade Elephant" seems perfectly appropriate for an Asian-themed place.

The Easter eggs I've included are more period-related, if you know what I mean. The name Everett (the mc of one ms) comes from Edward Everett, the orator who spoke before Lincoln at Gettysburg. And there are a few oblique paraphrases of Lincoln quotes. I also make explicit allusions, like when one character asks if another is an "irrepressible conflict" man. Those familiar with the pre-Civil War era will be aware that that phrase was made famous (or "infamous", to Southerners) by Wm. H. Seward. But I've never added any Easter eggs personal to me.
 
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Marissa D

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Oh, I love historical easter eggs, both putting them in my own stories and finding others. I once found a very obscure one in a favorite author's book and wrote to him to confirm--he was tickled that someone actually found it.
 

gothicangel

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As long as you root your story in the historical past (i.e. setting, politics etc.) its Historical Fiction.