recs?

[ratcreature]

For similar reasons that I find the BBC Historical Farm series soothing, I also like historical fiction that makes everyday life details come alive and be interesting, particularly things you wouldn't really think about or necessarily expect to be different, instead of just glossing things over. Like stories that describe how tools look and work, that you don't use anymore today and stuff like that.

I enjoy this regardless of the period, e.g. I liked the details how prehistoric life might have worked in Clan of the Cave Bear. I actually like those details in mundane science fiction too, like I enjoyed that aspect of The Martian.

I'm not entirely sure what quality exactly makes this delightful rather than tedious to me, but there's often some overlap with competence kink and/or service kink in examples I particularly enjoy, and also the author being really into the period or craft or such.

Do you have any recs for original fic or fanfic that provides a lot of immersive, everyday detail of this type? (Also it needs to be fairly non-tragic...)

Comments

[marinarusalka]

Do you like mystery fiction? Dick Francis was really into giving his protagonists interesting occupations and going into loving, copious details about what those occupations entailed. His books are heavy on the competence kink, too.

[ratcreature]

I used to read more mystery than I do now, but I still enjoy them. Most recently I've read the Benjamin January mysteries.

I'm not familiar with Dick Francis. Do you recommend any in particular?

[marinarusalka]

It depends on how interested you are in horse racing. Francis is a former jockey, and in his early books, the heroes were almost all jockeys. Later he started having heroes in other professions, though the plot always has some kind of horse connection. For non-jockey protagonists, I’d recommend Proof, Banker and Twice Shy.

Caveat — it’s been years since I read Francis, and I can’t remember the details well enough to say how well his books have aged. He’s a straight white British dude born in 1920, though, and his his books are very white dude-centric.

[ratcreature]

Thanks for the pointers.

I can't say horse racing ever particularly figured into my interests. (I was very much not into horses as a girl, much to the astonishment of my best friend from fifth grade onwards, who had actually convinced her parents to get her a pony, rode it in competitions and kept trying to get me to visit it with her, but after encountering it once I mostly found it scary and much larger than I imagined a pony would be.)

[mific]

I used to read a lot of murder mysteries - now more f/sf. I liked the Francis novels as you learn about a different aspect of horse racing in each one, but I don't think most would be dense enough in practical details to be quite what you like the most. And they haven't aged all that well in terms of modern politics and sensibilities, although his heroes are all refreshingly nice, sensible blokes and there's always a happy ending for them. :)

[mellowtigger]

One of the many reasons that I liked the Babylon 5 sci-fi television series is that it actually showed us (for the first time!) someone in the future using the bathroom. Amazing! Boring, but amazing!

[ratcreature]

I like B5 too.

[frith_in_thorns]

Have you read Hild? Historical fiction, I really enjoyed it.

[ratcreature]

No, I haven't, though actually I bought it several years ago and it has been languishing in my TBR pile since roughly 2014... Thanks for reminding me of it.

[mific]

One of my all-time faves from my youth is the 'My Side of the Mountain' trilogy by Jean Craighead George.
TH White's 'The Goshawk' is also interesting, about his attempt to train a hawk using traditional methods.

[ratcreature]

Thanks for the recs, I'll take look.