Last week, Sarah Johnson posted on the Historical Novel Society blog about which centuries have been best represented in traditionally published historical fiction in the last year. You can check out the results for yourself (don’t forget to read the comments, many of them are very interesting and insightful). The sample size is the books reviewed in the Historical Novels Review, so there may be some limitations there, but all in all, there are some very interesting results here.
So that’s what is being published, but what are readers most into?
Luckily, author Mary Tod is asking that very question. She surveyed over 800 readers of historical fiction, 2/3 of whom say that more than 25% of their reading is comprised of historical fiction. She came up with a lot of data, but I am going to highlight a few of the things I found most interesting:
* Respondents list strong female character, life of a significant historical figure, and life of lesser known historical figures as the types of stories that most appeal to them
*Respondents list stories with a military angle, thrillers, and romance as those which appeal to them the least
* Men actually list military angles in their top three, along with significant historical figure and adventure story, however they are so underrepresented in the survey (presumably because they read so much less historical fiction, but Tod herself admits that this is not exactly a scientific survey) that their preferences don’t influence much for this question
* The 13th to 16th centuries are the most popular, over 50% of respondents listed it as one of their three favorite time periods. On 25% of respondents chose the 20th century, making it the 5th most popular time period. The 19th century was the second choice overall, with about 45% of respondents choosing it. Note: I think some of the disparity as to the 20th century being popular with publishers vs. readers is that many 20th century works may appeal to people who would not necessarily identify as heavy readers of the genre because those who primarily read contemporary find it relatively close to what they are used to.
* The three most popular historical geographies are Europe, Britain, and the US – in that order and by quite a margin over any other locale, although Europe and Britain are about 75% more popular than the US.
* Only 11% of respondents (and keep in mind this was an online poll, so those who responded are relatively comfortable with technology) are reading mostly ebooks, although about 40% say they read a mix of both ebooks and paper – although no indication what that mix is.
I also found Tod’s breakdowns of the gender gaps in responses and of what bothers people in historical fiction fascinating, although I’ll let you peruse those on your own so I don’t overwhelm anyone with bullet points.
If you were surveying readers, what would you want to know?
