In view of the sluggishness of the fiction market and my ongoing historical research, I’ve been seriously considering the concept of creative non-fiction. As a one time fan of Dava Sobel, I think I at least have an inkling of what’s involved, and a fellow writer has encouraged me with the news that C.N.F. really is easier to sell, particularly as it attracts men as well as women readers.
It was partly with this in mind that I sat down in front of last night’s Desperate Romantics – BBC’s much vaunted new take on the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood .
The preview, I admit, had aroused some misgivings on the casting front. Could Aidan (Being Human) Turner let me forget his fabulously sympathetic vampire, and lead me to an understanding of Dante Gabriel Rosetti?
The answer proved to be no, and Turner wasn’t the only problem. The casting was so bizarre that I failed to get a grip on any of the main characters with the exception of the fictional narrator and Effie Ruskin (played by the ever classy Zoe Tapper). After the show I found myself on Wikipedia refreshing my knowledge of the Pre-Raphaelites and discovering that the first episode was in factual terms probably correct. Rosetti was a louche. Ruskin was impotent. But the fatal combination of casting and production (whimsical incidental music and the stridently modern dialogue) prevented me from believing a word of it. An interesting case of truth proving, if not stranger than fiction, certainly less plausible.
The book on which the series is based will be published later this year. Fingers crossed it that this isn’t the first time a T.V. tie-in reduces book sales. Meanwhile, if you know of any good examples of creative non-fiction, please add your comment!
I’m left wondering what the series is trying to do, aside from adding a bit of colour to a drab mid-week schedule. Creative it may have been, but unless subsequent episodes pick up, I can’t see it will offer any new insight into the period or even tell a compelling story. I would think that a work of creative non-fiction might do both.
Ali Bacon / Books Etc 
Creative Non Fiction sounds much better than the awful Faction that some people use.
From my recent reading of the genre, Dava Sobel’s books work for me but I found Peter Ackroyd’s “The Lambs of London” and Kate Summerscale’s “The Suspicions of Mr Whicher” irritating for different reasons: the first because he used real characters but made silly changes to the known facts and the second because she packed in too much fact, sometimes repeating information several times.
“The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society” is probably not quite in this genre but the fictional characters revealing something of the real experience of the occupation of the Channel Islands was hugely popular. Then there followed Libby Cone’s “War on the Margins” which has a very real factual foundation, made more accessible to the non-historian by the interest in the fictional characters. That too has proved to be a popular book.
Sorry for the long comment. If I’m typical of your target audience, I hope it is helpful.
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Very useful indeed!
Guernsey LPPPS is the only one I know. I think all good fiction should illuminate period or place as well as character. Recently read ‘The Great Lover’ by Jill Dawson about Rupert Brook. If anything I felt the story sufffered from too much reliance on historical sources. Hoping I have found a ‘real’ story that needs little or no no fictional embellishment – just lots of research! I imagine it as a ‘drama documentary’ – if that makes sense.
AliB
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I look forward to reading it, Ali.
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