Fifty years ago, if you wanted to be considered a serious novelist, you might write a contemporary novel. One that captured the current moment and all its anxieties, fashions, technologies. But in the 21st century, the historical novel would give you far better odds for a critical hit. According to Alexander Manshel, author of the forthcoming book Writing Backwards: Historical Fiction and the Reshaping of the American Canon, between 2000 and 2020, about three quarters of the novels shortlisted for the National Book Award, the Pulitzer Prize, and the National Book Critics Circle Award took place in the historical past. The New York Times Sunday book review section even has a regular, dedicated column for the genre. One of the paper’s critics, Megan O’Grady, has praised our current time as a “golden age” for the historical novel.

Think of authors like Hilary Mantel, Toni Morrison, Colson Whitehead, Min Jin Lee, Louise Erdrich, and Viet Thanh Nguyen. Their books often do more than transport us to another time. When they focus on lesser known histories, they ask us to consider what is worth remembering at all. This week, OTM producer Eloise Blondiau speaks to Alexander Manshel and authors Alexander Chee and Min Jin Lee about how historical fiction became a rich resource for reckoning with our past.