Truthfully, I've yet to read a well written fanfic using historical events. I've read a lot of historical setting fanfics, but it's very difficult to use real events. I would love to see more fanfics tying in real events because it gives me a chance to learn something new and it shows creative thinking in the writers minds.

In contrast, it seems many modern fantasy books rely on using historical events as backstory but use it poorly. I remember getting annoyed in The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel when the story threw in Geek mythology and events with Egyptian.

The best story that I recommend that makes use historical events to progress the story is Red River. I base all the judgment around that manga.

Favorite time period would have to be Victorian Times. There was so much going on that didn't require a war: social differences changing, new technology spreading in contrast to the old ways like cars and horse buggies, a lot of my favorite authors had their heyday during this time, and how the culture was very subtle; a softly spoken witty comment could outmatch a brandish loud comment.

i like using history as a setting. I've used it as a setting before. I also like taking events and working around them, but that is infinitely more difficult. I do like to work around war. I wrote an inu/kag fic based on the aftermath of hiroshima. It might just be because i know about about the wars that I use them. I don't know.

Can only recall perhaps one fiction that was based on some historical events. 'Beside You In Time' by RosieB that follows Sesshoumaru and Kagome pacing through history across the globe. It is difficult to be precise perhaps when dealing with historical events, particularly if said events revolve around other cultures, and countries, doubly so if one cannot actually visit those places, or emmerse themselves amidst the people in those times. Research after all can only do so much. Imagination is the next step, though perhaps the most difficult in being able to construe a storyline, a plot, that is plausible for the historical era. Keeping characters 'in character' exhibiting behaviours and beliefs of the time also poses a challenge.

The rest is open to interpretation, unless of course an author wants exact historical accuracy. Only a handful of professional authors perhap employ this successfully too.

Historical events are touchy business when dealing in fanfiction. Some can be pulled off easily, especially when you're talking things in the very distant past like the time period Inuyasha is set in because there isn't an accurate historical record of exactly what went on (as we know, especially those that are older, history books and what was taught forever as the absolute facts of things change as more things are discovered and technology changes to where they can now prove things they couldn't). But others, such as World War II and things in the 'modern age' that are very documented aren't that easy. However, there are some things that if you do a modern work can't be just ignored (i.e. what happened in Japan in World War II if the characters lived from the feudal era on). But it's a tricky thing to pull off if you are trying to be historically accurate about things or base a timeline about something that is well documented.

However, there is one other thing, when it comes to all this, that hasn't been mentioned that should be since it does crop up here and there... Whether you SHOULD do it or not. An example of this is a fic i saw about a year ago (no I'm not telling where and the fic is gone, author pulled it, after a large hue and cry over the content)that was basing the story around the events of 9/11 and using that as an excuse to employ all kinds of lemon scenes with all the major characters of Inuyasha leading up to the bombings. The word bad taste comes to mind. I've debated, in the past for one story, using the saran gas attacks in the Tokyo subway as a reason Kagome's father isn't around but decided against it, thinking it wasn't in the best of taste to do so (some would see it that way, some wouldn't and i don't want to offend). So, it comes down to a matter of think about it before you use something traumatic in a fiction. What you see as fine, others can take exception to. Though that holds true for much content out there, in the case of events that are real and carry a high emotional impact, one should think long and hard before they use them.

Thank you to those who have replied thus far



I agree that there are some events that should not be touched, or if they are touched they should be approached with great care. I do like to write stories that include world war one or two, but I research everything that was done and that had happened. My grandmother was actually kept in the concentration camp in Belgium during world war two. Even to this day the events she experienced then, are still with her. She is very sensitive to the tale and does not like watching any movies that have to do with it. A few years ago she was hospitalized because her insides were pretty much falling out of her. The doctors kept calling her houdini because she would pull the breathing tube out by herself, she slapped a few nurses and she kept trying to pull everything out of her because all of it reminded her of her time in the concentration camp. It got so bad that she actually had to be restrained. She also wouldn't eat because she thought it was poisoned and the doctors were trying to kill her. It was hard seeing her in so much pain and so panicked. So I do agree that even if twenty years or more pass for some people these historic events bring back bad memories for them.

I also agree with the 9/11 thing. Does anyone remember the movie based off of it that was released a year or two after the event had happened? I did not go see that movie and I was strongly against it. I also began to dislike most of actors/actresses that took part in the movie. It just seemed really insensitive to me and I wasn't fond of the movie at all.