I've always thought that the Cadfael series had as a major
theme the beauty and rightness of young love, that Cadfael would do just
about anything (including lying and stealing) to protect the young
lovers. That attitude shows him to be able to -- within a fairly rigidly
rule-bound system (both the society and his monastic order)-- choose his
own path, to choose a value above obedience, and also, despite
monasticism and celibacy, to connect to the life-giving force of romance
and sex. Ellis Peters is such a graceful writer, she was able to show him
being almost gooey (my term :) about his young-couple friends, while
maintaining his necessarily sleuthly distance.

Murder mysteries are so much about death (of course), but what I've
always loved about Cadfael is that stubborn connection to life. Then
again (I love the Cadfael books devotedly, so get a bit gooey myself),
that echoes the other major contrast of the sacred and the profane, the
profane being the human-- the interactions with the other monks and
priests, the town beyond the walls, the civil war raging beyond that,
Cadfael's own checquered past.

I'm not sure anyone did better than EP at finding the teeming sensual
life within the mystery setting.

Alicia (who must now embark on another re-read....)

Historical fiction, or historical contemporary fiction?

Historical fiction written as historical fiction: Georgette Heyer writing about the Regency, a century or more past her own time.
Then there's Jane Austen writing about her own time... but it's historical for US.

Benefits:
Jane Austen will -- being steeped in it-- probably be faithfully representing the culture and especially language as she perceives it. But she will be blinkered by a narrow perspective and of course the lack of ability to research different viewpoints or see what happens after her own time.

Historical fiction-- greater context, more distance, more understanding of the causes and effects. But the colloquialism of the language might be suspect-- replicating conversations which were not "heard".

Class structure, snobbery, class conflict

In 4:50 from Paddington, Miss Marple refers to an estate owned by a wealthy family. With something like disdain, she says, "Not one of our... families. Victorian millionaires." She goes on to remember that the family fortune is based on cookies: "Crackenthorpe's Fancies. Silly name for a biscuit, I've always thought."

British Fiction

Agatha Christie...
Ellis Peters...
Georgette Heyer
Susan Howatch
Dorothy Dunnett...


British... or just writing about Britain.