Hey, fellow history nerds and reluctant parents/teachers — if you’ve ever wished your kid (or student… or spouse) would care about the past as much as they care about TikTok, I’ve got the ultimate hack: stop forcing dry textbooks on them and start sneaking history in through heart-wrenching, page-turning historical fiction.
I’m the person who owns more historical novels than shoes, who cries over books set in WWII, ancient Rome, and the American Civil War like it’s my job. And after years of testing this on my own kids, my students, and random skeptical adults, I can tell you with 100 % confidence: pairing a soul-crushing novel with a rock-solid nonfiction book is the single most effective (and sneaky) way to create lifelong history lovers.
When I Reach for Fiction Instead of Footnotes (My Personal Cheat Sheet)
Here’s the truth—I don’t pick sides between story and scholarship. I use both, just at different moments:
– Want someone to fall hopelessly in love with the past and stay up until 2 a.m. reading under the covers? → Hand them the novel.
– Want them to destroy someone in a debate or write a paper that makes the teacher cry? → Time for the nonfiction with all the juicy footnotes.
– When do the traditional history books ignore entirely women, children, enslaved people, or everyday folks? → Fiction fills in the emotional blanks beautifully (and responsibly).
– When a kid looks you dead in the eye and says, “I hate reading”? → I’m not fighting that war with a 600-page academic brick. I’m sliding them, All the Light We Cannot See, or I, Claudius, and walking away whistling.
The Magic Formula I Swear By
1. Start with the novel. Let it wreck them emotionally.
(Example: A blind French girl and a German boy during WWII? They’re not putting that book down.)
2. Wait for the inevitable moment they look up wild-eyed and ask, “Wait… did this actually happen?”
3. That’s your cue. Casually slide the nonfiction across the table like a drug dealer with the good stuff.
Once they care that deeply? Game over. They’ll devour anything—primary sources, dense biographies, even economic histories (yes, really).
Some of my all-time favorite “light the fire → feed the flames” pairings:
– All the Light We Cannot See (Anthony Doerr) → A Woman of No Importance (Sonia Purnell) or Citizens of London (Lynne Olson). The book is much more detailed than the movie.
– The Book Thief (Markus Zusak) → When Time Stopped (Ariana Neumann) or The Diary of a Young Girl (Anne Frank, expanded edition)
– I, Claudius (Robert Graves) → SPQR (Mary Beard) or Rubicon (Tom Holland)
– Pachinko (Min Jin Lee) → The Birth of Korean Cool (Euny Hong) or actual Korean family histories
– Homegoing (Yaa Gyasi) → The Half Has Never Been Told (Edward Baptist) or Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
The Bottom Line (and Why This Actually Changes Lives)
History isn’t a list of dates—it’s millions of human stories full of courage, betrayal, love, and survival. Historical fiction lets us feel those stories in our bones. Then the best nonfiction gives us the receipts.
When you let a novel light the fire and the history book feed the flames, something magical happens: people stop seeing the past as “boring” and start seeing it as the greatest drama ever told.
So next time someone in your life swears they hate history, don’t argue. Just hand them a novel that rips their heart out… and wait.
Trust me—the 2 a.m. Google searches (and the lifelong obsession) are coming.
What’s your favorite historical fiction + nonfiction combo? Drop it in the comments—I’m always looking for new ways to wreck people’s emotions (in the best way).
Happy reading,
Your friendly neighborhood historical fiction evangelist.
