I enjoy working bits of history into my books. I have not felt the call to write about actual people as the base for my historical fiction books but rather time periods and events. I can’t justify playing with the incidents and emotions of a person’s life, though they are in the past. Although, I enjoy reading that type of historical fiction.
A Bit of History in Silver Moon:
One true event that I wrote into my upcoming book, Silver Moon, is The Halifax Explosion. If you’ve never heard of it, let me give you a few details. Wikipedia says, “The blast was the largest man-made explosion at the time (1917), releasing the equivalent energy of roughly 2.9 kilotons of TNT.” From reading through research, I found that within a half-mile radius of the explosion site nearly everything was obliterated, as if wiped off the face of the Earth. It killed over 2,000 people and injured over 900.
Being during WWI, it might be easy to assume the blast was war related, but no evidence of that can be found. It’s believed it was purely accidental.
For some reason a ship called Imo collided with the Mont-Blanc, carrying explosives close to the Halifax harbor. Although the collision itself wasn’t disastrous, the domino effect afterward set the explosion into motion. Barrels of fuel tipped on the Mont-Blanc, the engines sparked, and fire spread until it reached the explosives it carried.
I don’t want to give away too much of the storyline of Silver Moon away, but I work this tragedy into several of the characters’ lives. To find out just who will survive and who won’t, you’ll need to read the book.
Read More:
You can read about the details of this disaster on Wikipedia.
I also read an excellent book for research, The Great Halifax Explosion, By John U. Bacon. I highly recommend it.
Read Historical Fiction Book Reviews:
I post every Wednesday here on my blog about a historical fiction book that I’ve read. Click on “What Jenny’s Reading” in the interest category to read all my posts or follow the link. Once there, click on the blog title to read the full post.
Thanks for letting me share my love of history with you!
Blessings, J