TL;DR I’m looking for TWO books to be recommended— a fiction and a nonfiction book that cover roughly the same events and would be fun to read in tandem.
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I have a bit of a strange request. Recently, I’ve been reading Ken Follett’s Kingsbridge series and really enjoying it. For those not familiar, the series is five books set in England, roughly between the years 1000-1800. The books are fictional but reference a lot of real events and people in English history.
While reading the second book in the series I decided to go back to a nonfiction book I read a few years ago: Plantagenets, by Dan Jones. I’ve been brushing up on the history that is referenced in the Ken Follett book and reading the two books in a roughly parallel manner. I’m really enjoying the experience of reading a fiction and nonfiction book about the same time period/historical event, so I’m looking for recommendations for more fiction/nonfiction pairings that go together really well and would be fun to read in tandem.
I’m interested in history generally and enjoy reading a lot of European/American history, although I’m always looking to expand my geographical horizons. I like learning about politics/society/government but I also particularly love what you might call “domestic history” about the lives of every day people. The Kingsbridge series has also piqued my interest in learning about the development of technology/the economy. I’m not a huge military history nerd but I’m open to it.
Sorry for the long post and thanks in advance for any recommendations!
by _mrs_darcy_