WEB FEATURES
The Historical Novel Society publishes original articles and interviews in its members-only print magazine, the Historical Novels Review. The Society also publishes original web features -- articles, interviews, guides, and more commissioned specifically for this website.
In general, features are commissioned by HNS editors and authored by members on their features teams, who are unpaid volunteers. If you are a member interested in joining the features team, print or web, please Contact Us.
Magic when you least expect it: A Year of Marvelous Ways by Sarah Winman
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BY MARILYN PEMBERTON What comes first, the plot, character or location? For Sarah Winman, ‘Characters always come first … but place is also extremely important.’ Winman believes that ‘What place does is to show a character something they would never... Read More
The Right Season for Amy Ephron’s Unseasonably Cold
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20th CenturyInterviewMystery & Crime
BY TRISH MACENULTY When Amy Ephron started out to write her noir-ish 1939 mystery, Unseasonably Cold, (The Sager Group, 2026) she did not expect the process to be interrupted by other writing projects. She started writing the book a few... Read More
If it isn’t one prison, it’s another: Liberty Street by Heather Marshall
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BY ELAINE O’CONNOR Heather Marshall’s latest novel, Liberty Street (Ballantine, June 2026) explores the many meanings of imprisonment, the societal norms and expectations used to constrain women’s lives. During Marshall’s undergraduate history studies, a professor introduced her to Incorrigible (Wilfred... Read More
Researching Life in the Great Depression: 1930s
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BY B.J. SEDLOCK I would count the Great Depression as one of the periods of Western history which stands out as a particularly interesting setting for a historical novel. The struggle of the ordinary citizen to make ends meet in... Read More
In praise of disagreeable women: The Mourning Necklace and The Repentants by Kate Foster
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BY KATE BRAITHWAITE “None of my women are perfect or even likeable and that is deliberate,” declares Kate Foster, but having read her two most recent novels, The Mourning Necklace (Mantle, May 2025) and The Repentants (Mantle, May 2026), I... Read More
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