Do you remember boring history lessons at school when you felt you were stuffed with terminology and numbers? And then reading your first historical novel, thinking: Why can’t history lessons be like this? Exciting, alive, more insightful, imaginative … Well, that’s probably why the genre of historical fiction has such a wide readership and is so wonderfully successful. You can meet some awarded authors of historical fiction at the 6th Annual Lakewood Film, Arts, and Book Festival this upcoming weekend.
Amongst others, Seattle native Denise Frisino has been working on stage and in film as an actress, writer, director, and producer before she turned to novel writing. Denise’s first historical fiction, “Whiskey Cove”, published only last year, was nominated for the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Award, a staff pick at Third Place Books, and is in its second printing. Set in the 1970s, the novel leads back into the Prohibition era in the Pacific Northwest and rum-running, a consequence of the demand for booze. It teems with gangsters, murder, and an underworld few of us are aware of as rampant in Puget Sound. Suspense and romance interweave before this backdrop to create a thrilling reading experience of a historical novel.
Paddy Eger is a veteran teacher from Edmonds, WA, and also an awarded writer. Her newest historical novel is “Tasman. An Innocent Convict’s Struggle for Freedom” in which she uncovers the dire conditions in 1850 Port Arthur, Tasmania, and reflects a terrible era in English-Irish history. A young Irishman is falsely accused of stealing a handkerchief and is transported on a prison ship to the penal colony to serve a three-year sentence at hard labor. Paddy puts herself into her protagonist’s shoes and delivers a heart-rending portrait based on historical facts. A tale of hardship, struggle for survival, and exoneration against all odds.
Award-winning Abraham Lincoln biographer D. L. Fowler from Gig Harbor, WA, spent his teenage years near the Lincoln Shrine in Redlands, CA. Maybe that is what incited him to travel in Abraham Lincoln’s footsteps. “Lincoln Raw” is D. L.’s latest historical novel about a man who lived through a tough and tragic boyhood, teaching himself to read and write, casting off his parents’ religion, becoming estranged with friends and himself, and ending up in deep depression. Resigned to a life of mediocrity, suddenly impending slavery expansion makes Lincoln face the greatest challenge of his life yet and become, after all, what he promised his mother: someone special.
Delve into historical fiction, have a chat with these authors! The 6th Annual Lakewood Film, Arts, & Book (FAB) Festival takes place on September 28, 29, and 30, 2018 from 12 through 9:30 pm at the Shirley McGavick Conference Center at Clover Park Technical College, 4500 Steilacoom Boulevard SW. The book/author section is open from noon till 6 pm. Please find further information, also about the Art Exhibition, at https://www.facebook.com/lakewoodfilmartsbooks.
