Immersive reading: My worlds and the world of Georgette Heyer

From as far back as I can remember, I have always been an avid reader. When I was in junior high school (I missed going to middle school by a few years) we moved into a house where I finally had not only my own bedroom but my own walk-in closet. I loved it partly because I could put a chair in the closet and sit there and read without interruption. Once, I was immersed in a book when my sister opened the closet door, intending to borrow a sweater. She stared at me open mouthed. When she told me what she wanted, I handed her the sweater and asked her to please close the door.

 

Surprisingly, considering that every book I have published to date is set either in a fantasy world, an alternate earth, or the far future, I love reading historical fiction, especially historical romance. I love being transported to the past, because in many ways, it's another world, with different customs, different speech patterns, and sometimes very different problems.

But unlike the far future, our past is a world we know something about. The best historical fiction is well researched. With the right amount of detail, historical fiction can make you feel that you're experiencing life in the past. To achieve this, characters shouldn't use modern idioms; and if they act in a way that we consider normal but wouldn't be tolerated in their actual time period, it needs to be clear they're not typical. One of the best writers I've ever encountered for immersing the reader into the past is Georgette Heyer. From the early 1920s to the late 1970s she wrote over 50 books-- mysteries, historical fiction and Regency romances. I have read pretty much every one.

I like some of her books more than others, of course, but in every book Heyer does a decent job of immersing the reader in that world. The ones I like best are those set in the "alien" world of Regency-era England, the second decade or so of the 19th century.

Society in that place and time was incredibly stratified. Not only wealth but social standing divided people into classes that did not mix socially. Women's lives were strictly circumscribed as to what was proper behavior. And men who aspired to call themselves gentlemen had an equally strict code, even if it was far less limiting of their activities. This gives Heyer's stories a setting that transports the reader from the everyday to the exotic.

I, too, want to transport my readers to a more exotic place and time. But unlike Heyer, I don't want to be limited to a specific place, or a specific set of rules of behavior that had actually existed as a setting for my stories.  Side note: I enjoy Heyer's stories more when they include purely fictional characters. I find the ones where she includes historical figures and actual events, like the Duke of Wellington at Waterloo to be less entertaining.

Back to my writing: In order to give myself total control, I create my own worlds, my own customs, sometimes my own species. But at the same time, in rereading Heyer's books and then rereading my own (which I do sometimes), I can see what a debt my stories owe to hers. 

In emulation of Heyer, I try to achieve that sense of immersion in a character's life, that makes the reader feel as if they were actually in that place and time. Like her: I give the major characters a family history and often have family members as characters; I stress familial and friendly relationships as well as romantic ones; I have my characters go through their daily activities, and in some cases, encounter humorous situations (as when a human man is invited for a family holiday on an alien world and discovers he'll be sharing a bed with the daughter of the house; Heyer's books may not have aliens, but they certainly have humor!); I describe clothes and customs with enough detail to give the reader a sense of what it's like to live in that place and time. And finally, I try not to have my heroes always be the same guy in a different hair cut.

In fact, I like to think that if Georgette Heyer had chosen to write her romances in a science fictional setting, we might well have attracted the same readers! And if you have never read anything by Georgette Heyer, you might want to check out her books. They're set in the past, but they are also timeless.