Hey, life hack here!

[conuly]

If you take your picture of your bookcase and rotate it *sideways*, then your readers' heads will be able to maintain their upright position!

Anyway, and only vaguely related, I have a terminology question. If somebody published a book in 2022 about 2020, you know, with the pandemic and all, is that historical fiction or contemporary?

Comments

[fred_mouse]

If I were tagging it, I'd call it contemporary.

[pauamma]

If fiction, not-a-librarian me would agree. But it could be autobiographical or self-help (eg, parenting).

[silveradept]

If it's fiction, contemporary.

[oloriel]

Contemporary, unless it's about a 2020 in which there was no pandemic. In that case, it's historical fiction.

[hashiveinu]

Wouldn't that be alternate history?

[oloriel]

True!

[readerjane]

I suppose technically two years ago is history. But practically, for the purposes of classification, I’d call it contemporary.

[kareina]

I would consider any fiction set in a time the author can remember as contemporary fiction, and any set in a time before the birth of the author as historical fiction. So when L.M. Montgomery set her Anne of Green Gables books in the time of her own childhood, she was writing contemporary fiction. The same for when James Herriot set his stories in the 1930's rather than the 1940's (when he was actually starting out a new veterinarian), because he had memories of the 1930's, even if he hadn't yet moved to the place he was writing about then.