As romance authors, we sometimes intentionally choose moments of historical hardship to write about, but why?
Are we a bunch of heartless people, looking to pull on reader’s heartstrings? Not really (though maybe…) Most of the time, we choose these moments in history for a few reasons:
It’s a good way to spread awareness of things that happened.
Let’s face it, history, even trying history, can be boring when in textbook form. Reading about floods and hurricanes, dust storms and wars can be easily pushed off as being about “other people” when it’s in the pages of a history book. History books are “just the facts, ma’am” publications and we want them that way. But, if you want people to really think about what people went through, put it in the pages of a fiction novel.
It reminds us of how strong humans really are.
When we write about people, we expect them to be heroes and heroines. Average joes (and janes) come to life on the pages as they rise above and do the impossible. These terrible situations did happen and while there were many bad outcomes for people, good things did happen in the midst of these awful situations. The Lord does provide hope.
When good things happen in the middle of a terrible situation, it make the hardship easier to process (and thus increases our understanding).
A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down (or so I’ve heard in a fun little song). That’s why history wrapped within a romance makes learning a little easier. If we only wanted a story about what happened, even fictionalized, we could just watch a docudrama or read regular historical fiction. But when we know there is the hope of a romance within the story, we can open the pages of the book knowing one good thing is going to come out of the book, even if it seems like many bad things could happen to other people.
In my research into the Galveston Hurricane of 1900, I’ve found all of these things to be true. While that particular storm has always fascinated me and I love history books, I haven’t picked up a book dedicated to that storm until recently when I decided to write 2 stories about it. There was so much devastation, so much loss, that I knew I would struggle with it if I couldn’t wrap my own story of hope within all that pain.
These bo
oks won’t be coming out for at least a year, but I’m doing the research now. What situations in history interest you but you wouldn’t want to read about them without adding a little hope to the story?
I haven’t done a giveaway in a while so I’ll choose one commenter to receive an ebook copy of To a Brighter Tomorrow. Winner will be chosen tomorrow evening.
I found a mention of a party that happened in the same week my characters arrived in Texas, so of course Madeline and Jonah attended. As well as this mention in the society column, a story chronicling the benefits of Dr. C. McLane’s Liver Pills and an advertisement for the Hazard Powder Company Blasting and Mining Powder actually appeared in the March 26, 1880 edition on the third page. Obviously there was no gossip about my fictional characters in that episode, although there were other interesting articles and advertisements. These included one for Jenkins’s Annihilator cure for rheumatism, gout and neuralgia, and another assuring readers that a cure for opium addiction could be found by purchasing morphine from the doctor who placed the ad. The name of the doctor in the opium cure ad is too blurry to read, which is probably just as well.