No doubt you were anxiously waiting for the 2015 favourite historical fiction authors list. First, an apology. Since publishing 2015’s favourite fiction list, I’ve been heads down finishing Time & Regret and only surfaced a few weeks ago. Fortunately, compiling the numbers was not as arduous this time.
A few observations:
- the top 5 remain the top 5 three years in a row. Kudos to Diana Gabaldon, Sharon Kay Penman, Philippa Gregory, Elizabeth Chadwick and Bernard Cornwell.
- Men and women differ in their top choices. Tabulating male responses exclusively, the top 8 are: Bernard Cornwell, Patrick O’Brian, Conn Iggulden, Sharon Kay Penman, Ken Follett, C.J. Sansom, Hilary Mantel and James Michener.
- Country choices also vary. For example, the top 5 choices in the UK are: Elizabeth Chadwick, Bernard Cornwell, Philippa Gregory, Sharon Kay Penman, and Hilary Mantel. Interesting to see Sharon Kay Penman remain in the top groups across gender and country.
- Authors tend to receive a higher portion of their support from their own country participants. For example, 75% of Diana Gabaldon’s popularity rests in the US.
- Not surprisingly, deceased authors receive more mentions from older participants.
- Every author in these two groups received more than 20 mentions.
I hope to cross-tabulate favourite authors against a few other factors and to look at age breakdowns in more detail. I will also publish a list of authors with 10 to 20 mentions.
One further statistic of interest: over 900 authors were mentioned as favourites. Wow.
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M.K. Tod writes historical fiction and blogs about all aspects of the genre at A Writer of History. Her latest novel, LIES TOLD IN SILENCE is set in WWI France and is available from Amazon, Nook, Kobo, Google Play and iTunes. Her debut novel, UNRAVELLED: Two wars. Two affairs. One marriage. is also available from these retailers.
10 Responses
Thank you so much Mary for all your hard work in compiling this interesting information. Yes Sharon always seems to be there and deservedly so. Another interesting point is how Diana’s wonderful books polled so highly in America and above Sharon too! We all have our favourites of course and there are many other authors also much loved by readers all over the world. How very blessed we readers are. The very best of luck with your new book. Leila x
You are welcome, Korculablue. A labour of love 🙂
I think it’s sad that the younger people don’t discover the older books. It seems that somehow people continue to discover Anya Seton’s “Katherine” but not a lot of other older novels. I’m glad that when I was growing up my library did not automatically discard the older books, giving me a chance to read them. I also think it’s odd that Diana Gabaldon does not have a large UK following -why? I’d suspect marketing except that I haven’t ever seen them marketed in the US either.
Hi Mary Sue .. I suppose the older authors are less and less publicized, and perhaps the style of writing feels a bit outdated to folks of the millennial generation 🙂
I see no mention of Alan Furst. Is he not considered a historical fiction writer? If so, why? Is WW2 too recent?
Hi Janice … Alan definitely writes historical fiction. Unfortunately, he did not receive that many mentions in the survey.