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Gabaldon, Diana
My reading habits were pretty consistent until my friendly office manager at the local bookstore called the Bookworm talked me in to reading "Outlander" by Diana Gabaldon. She would even go into the romance books with me when a new one would arrive. Gabaldon became popular enough that the last Outlander book, which was hardbound and mainstream, made it to the Costco Wholesale book stack. They purchase in shipping pallet quantities. The Outlander series also started being identified as historical fiction, which is what it really is. You have to know up front that Gabaldon is not your typical romance writer. The author has a Ph.D. in Ecology and understands the laws of thermodynamics. Her stories take place in an alternate universe, i.e., they start in Scotland just before the Jacobite revolution where the Stuart Prince made his last stand at Culloden. People fight with cannons, muzzle loaders, and swords. The heroine, who was a 20th century surgeon, is trying to cope with 18th century medicine and using terms that had the 18th century Scottish people wondering if she was a witch. She also had a husband back in the 20th century. Get the picture. It almost sounds like some of my post-apocalypse stories with a little Gaelic thrown in. The only major difference is that the primary hero isn't immortal and my ancestor's were part of that timeframe. There have always been family stories about how they jumped over to Northern Ireland from Scotland to save their heads. I always thought it was because of Culloden. One of the articles on the web page is a diary of "One of those days". She leads an incredibly complex life. Anyone who thinks they have a busy life or wants to find out how to cram much more activity into a day should read the article and then drop by their local bookstore and purchase Outlander. Her typical stories are the only ones that I read with more pages than a Clancy novel. The best part is that they are interesting from page 1. Clancy usually needs 100-150 pages to set things up and then it is non-stop action for the next 500 or so pages.
Another person that has reacted to the Gabaldon storytelling is located on Gavin McNett's Salon Web Page. This an interesting review because the author went through the same discovery process that I did.
I seem to have run out of steam with Diana's Outlander stories. She has a new one out called "A Breath of Snow and Ashes" but I never finished the previous one. I could never get into the story and it is in my pile of partially read books.
Gingrich, Newt, and Forstchen, William R.
The first time I encountered their book called Gettysburg it really confused me. I have read a number of books on the Civil War and it looked like a historical novel. The problem was that the battles were slightly off and the wrong people were dying in battle. I had missed the tagline "inventive series" and "alternate version", which would have made my life less complicated. I read "Grant Comes East" as soon as it hit the paperback market. I finally found a copy of "Never Call Retreat", which is the final story of their trilogy. I think the stories are really put together well. They read like the Generals had simply made different decisions. They are frequently the decisions that should have been made and this changes history.
If you ever want to be humiliated, play a computer game version of the Battle of Gettysburg. The typical choice is to want to be the General that won, which in real life which was not Lee. The worst mistake is to let the computer play Lee. This is where you made a serious mistake because there are none of the hesitations that cost the Confederacy the battle. When a division comes up against a Union cavalry regiment, they walk through them. In the real battle, the CSA encountered a dismounted cavalry regiment and hesitated. The dismounted cavalry were fighting like a division and this confused the Confederate General that was trying to get into Gettysburg. This hesitation gave the Union time to get their divisions into position and eventually led to winning the battle.
In Gingrich and Forstchen's version, it is Lee that made the superior decision and the Union General that made the serious blunder. They have a Union General that thought he could carry the day and was virtually wiped out. This left nothing in the way of Lee's marching into Washington. This forces Grant into crossing the Susquehanna River sooner than he should have but this instantly stops Lee's advance on Washington.
Gingrich and Forstchen have a new book out called "Perl Harbor: A Novel of December 8, 1941". It is about the sneak attack on Perl Harbor from the Japanese side. GF writes, what they call active history, which allows them to speculate on what ifs and not have it be science fiction. In this book, Yammamoto leads the attack and changes things slightly. It makes it interesting.
Their latest book is called "Days of Infamy". It starts after the second attack and shortly before Yamamoto orders the third strick of Hawaii. He follows up by having 2 battleships, several carriers, and support ships circle the island, dropping 14 inch shells in various important places. He wanted to suck Bull Halsey in and let him finish the job and sink the carriers. The Americans were enraged by the sneek attack and when you are in this mood, you can make serious errors.Gingrich and Forstchen focus on this by actively changing history. They write really good alternate versions of historical battles. They are so good that they can confuse you with their alternate history and you aren't really sure what happened.
When I first got my amateur radio license, I started collecting QSL cards. At some point, I noticed that I had cards from every Pacific island that we had fought a major battle over in WWII. It was at this point that I became interested in WWII naval history in the Pacific. I have read numerous books based on "what if" senarios but none of them have hit hot-spots of interest like their "Perl Harbor" and "Days of Infamy" have done.
In the real world, Yamamoto backed off when the planes didn't get any of the US carriers. In Days of Infamy, I didn't get confused like I did with their alternate version of the Civil War. I had to chuckle, my reading speed is slowing down. I needed over 4 hours to read it. There were some breaks and a telephone call but it was definitely a one night book.
Robson, Lucia St. Clair
One of the first western/Indian style historical fiction books that I read was "Ride The Wind". Cynthia Parker was kidnapped by the Comanche and became a full fledged member of the People (Comanche). She ended up being the bride of Nocono and the mother of Quanah. That made her a very important person with the People.
When she was captured and brought back to live with the Parkers, she could never fit in. The Comanche's treated their enemies butally and were treated brutally back. Eventually, the numbers of Tejanos and their repeating rifles were too much. The Comanche's also made a number of stupid tactical mistakes. It would not have mattered because Crazy Horse understood how to fight the white man but their lack of numbers were against them. You can win all of your battles until you cease to be a fighting force because of death and injuries and suddenly you could be wiped out to the last fighting person. What we did to the Comanche was no different than what they had done to the other tribes. You just do not see the magnitude of lies and deceit that went on with white man's treatment of the Northern tribes.
Quanah Parker was able to bridge both worlds and was a major player with the People and with the Texas society he was forced to live in. There are some interesting web sites such as Fort Parker, and Cynthia Parker by the Universtify of Texas. The work of Robson may be fiction but it still is an incredible story to read. My ancestors moved to Texas in the mid-1800's but family stories involved losing people to the Mexican wars but not to the Comanche's.
Robson has written a number of books. At one point, it seemed that they were mostly out of print and then I got an email that said my comment was no longer accurate. I visited her site and I see that "Tokaido Road" will be reissued in November 2005 and only "Light a Distant Fire" is out of print in English.
Her books were all interesting to read but none had the impact on me that "Ride The Wind" did. What also surprised me is that I didn't have a link to her web site. I was also told that I probably missed reading one. She has a new hardbound book out called "Shadow Patriots" (Amazon or Barnes and Noble). The question in my mind is how did I miss that one. The cover is different because it almost looks like a cover from a romance novel. I think it was the covers of "Ghost Warrior" and "Ride The Wind" that caught my eye.
I stopped by Barnes and Nobel but they only had paperback versions of "Ride The Wind" and "Ghost Warrior". The local Hastings only had "Ghost Warrior".You could do a search on either title on a Hasting kiosk and Robson would not show. Finally, I went and got the spelling of her name and did a simple search by entering "lucia robson". I think 3 books showed up and her name was not spelled correctly on any of them. It was truly butchered on "Shadow Patriots". Instead of spaces they had lots of "¢" symbols. I emailed the webmaster and maybe it will be fixed soon.
Haseloff, Cynthia
I just finished my 2nd Cynthia Haseloff book. This one is titled Satanta's Woman. I throughly enjoyed it. I first encountered Haseloff with her book called "The Chains of Sarai Stone", which I also enjoyed. She has 2 or 3 other books that I will have to see if I can find in the used book store. I looked in the Westerns but just noticed that they are considered to be historical fiction. I will have to look again.
A. B. Daniel
A. B. Daniel is a pseudonym for two French writers. They worte a series called "Incas". The only reason I noticed the books was that the 3rd book was in the new book section at our local Hastings. The 3 stories concern Gabriel Montelucar y Flores and a pretty half indian by the name of Anamaya. The stories are as interesting as those written by J. A. Jance but I didn't read a new one each night.