Writing Fiction Based on a Real-Life Historical Figure
When I began work on my historical novel Lady Codebreaker, the stack of research books on my desk was only nine inches tall. It was a manageable, reasonable pile.
(Why We Must Embrace Reading and Writing Historical Fiction.)
I was all set to inhale these books about Elizebeth Smith Friedman—one of the first female cryptanalysts to work for the U.S. government—and exhale my fictionalized heroine inspired by her, Grace Smith Feldman. How naïve I was!
It had not occurred to me that I’d become so in awe of the real Elizebeth that I’d be intimidated, paralyzed even. How would I do justice to this remarkable woman?
I hadn’t yet figured out that to show codebreaker Grace in action on the page, I’d have to learn rudimentary cryptanalysis myself. Nor had I realized that this novel would call for extensive research on WWI, Prohibition, and WWII—plus basic knowledge of psychiatric treatment in the first half of the 20th century.
My initial stack of research books would grow to become several leaning towers of Pisa. With such a sprawling timeline (did I mention she was remarkable?), I realized the book would need to be written in four sections, each with a three-act plot, plus an overarching, separate story to tie it all together and bring Grace’s fascinating, challenging journey full circle. As a right-brained person, one plot is tough enough for me to hammer out—much less five. I admit it, some days I just wanted to throw my laptop into the lake and hide under my desk.
So how did I transform Elizebeth Smith Friedman into Grace Smith Feldman, the protagonist of all five plots? And how can you do it in your own book?
The key thing to remember is that while a journalist or historian’s primary job is to present the facts, a novelist’s job is to make the reader feel. To put the reader into the protagonist’s shoes.
You must sift through the mountains of history for the true heart of your novel—and you find that in emotion, not a string of facts.
You ask tough questions: What does your character want out of life? What does she care about the most and why? What is stopping her from getting it? Once she does, how will she react if you take it away? What are your protagonist’s strengths, fears, insecurities, and flaws? What are her biggest challenges? Who is her nemesis, and how can she battle him or her? How high are the stakes of her journey? What catastrophe will occur if she fails?
Check out K.D. Alden’s Lady Codebreaker here:
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The answers to these questions lead to tighter plotting. I had to discard some historical details and rearrange others, in service to the book’s structure and a necessity for rising action and rising stakes that lead to a crisis. And I had to make sure that each external plot “beat” caused an internal reaction, emotion, or change in my heroine.
Elizebeth, a.k.a. Grace, wanted to live a life outside of the ordinary. She achieved that goal. She struggled mightily to be the perfect codebreaker (thousands of lives depended upon her brain and her pencil). But she also struggled simultaneously to be a good wife, a loving mother, a cook, a housekeeper.
She struggled against deep-seated patriarchy and chauvinism, men who took credit for her work. She had to battle her husband’s deep depression and keep it a secret because of the stigma surrounding mental illness.
Grace was proud of her integrity … so I created a series of events that challenged it.
Grace’s husband was her deep love, and the Friedmans’ (Feldmans’) most prized possession was their library of books on cryptanalysis. So I began the novel with a threat to that library, and illustrated that Grace was also fighting to keep her husband’s mind, soul, and reputation intact. I put all of those things on the line.
Finally, I put Grace between the ultimate rock and a hard place: if she had to choose, would her loyalty be to her husband—or to her country?
Tips for planning your own historical novel:
Do, of course, research—but pay attention to things you come across that produce emotion in YOU. For example, when I read that J. Edgar Hoover took credit for much of my heroine’s work, I was angry on her behalf. I channeled that anger into a whole plot framework for the book, wherein she goes toe to toe with the powerful director of the FBI. That framing plot is complete fiction, but the idea stems from accurate historical fact.Create timelines for quick reference: i.e. mine were General History of early 20th c., True Personal Histories, Adaptation of Personal Histories, WWI chronology, and WWII chronology.Examine those timelines for dramatic or interesting historical facts that you can focus on to create your plot(s) and setting(s). Pick and choose what seems most helpful for characterization, external action plot, and internal/emotional plot.Decide whether you want your characters and plot to remain in the past or link the past with some present-tense developments. For example, the J. Edgar Hoover scenes mentioned above take place in the book’s “present” of 1958, while the rest of Lady Codebreaker unspools chronologically from 1917 until the two plots intersect in a crisis at the end of the novel.
If you become overwhelmed, try listing facts on notecards, or making a diagram—or even just sitting down and writing through the fear. There are also many plotting tools available to help. Here’s an overview of several, compiled by Pamela Koehne-Drube.
Play the “what if?” game. Jumble things. And most of all, enjoy the puzzle!
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