Nonfiction November: Nonfiction Pairings

 

Welcome back to the second week of Nonfiction November! This week’s writing prompt is brought to us by Sarah over at Sarah’s Book Shelves, who writes:

This week, pair up a nonfiction book with a fiction title. It can be a “If you loved this book, read this!” or just two titles that you think would go well together. Maybe it’s a historical novel and you’d like to get the real history by reading a nonfiction version of the story.

Wow, what a fantastic prompt! This one really got my gears going. There are so many different directions I could have taken when writing this week’s post, but I finally decided to focus on nonfiction titles for fans of historical fiction icon Phillipa Gregory.

Phillipa Gregory is one of my guiltiest literary pleasures. Her characters sometimes feel painfully anachronistic, but at the same time I just can’t get enough of her classed-up bodice rippers, which follow the lives of leading figures in English history, with a particular focus on the Tudor period. Gregory is incredibly prolific, and her books have been adapted into films and television series.

I’ll be the first to admit that Gregory has a fantastic ability to weave a gripping tale, but while she obviously does a great deal of research when writing her historical novels, her works can often be more historical fiction than historical fact.

Fortunately, if you share my interest in this period in history and would like to learn more about what life was actually like in Tudor England, there are a number of well-written, thoroughly researched nonfiction titles that can entertain as well as elucidate.

Alison Weir is a very popular historian and biographer who has written several works on prominent English historical figures, including Henry VIII and his many wives. It should be noted that Weir writes both historical fiction and nonfiction, so be sure to check which books are which if you’re looking for one or the other!

Melanie Clegg is a self-described “International woman of history, biographer, posh doomer, thwarted nihilist, feminist killjoy, terrible dickhead, not goth, chaotic good, ENFP.” Like Weir she writes both historical fiction and nonfiction, and has written several biographies of figures from European history that overlap with Gregory’s fictional titles. I find Margaret Tudor to be a particularly interesting figure – she’s often overshadowed by her more famous brother, but she was quite the interesting figure herself.

Suzannah Lipscomb is a professor, historian, author, researcher, and television presenter who has hosted some of my favourite history programs (I particularly love her “Hidden Killers in the ___ Home”, in which she looks at the different everyday killers present in English homes at different points in history). Lipscomb is an undisputed expert in the field of English history, and  has written several books about the Tudors, often taking a slightly different approach to the topic than more traditional biographers.

And there you have it –  a fantastic selection of nonfiction that’s perfect for fans of Phillipa Gregory who would like a bit more history with their historical fiction.

Check back in next week for another edition of Nonfiction November!