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Epic, First World War, historical fiction, lost generation, Marion Davies, William Randolph Hearst, WW I
Top ten reasons why historical fiction is better than history:
- #10: There is no history in the real world. (Be honest: has knowing or not knowing the date of the Peloponnesian Wars had the slightest impact on your daily life?)
- #9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2: Lies, damn lies, and history. The pyramids (mostly) were not built by Jewish slaves, there was no wooden horse at Troy, Columbus didn’t ‘discover’ America, the Pope isn’t infallible, George Washington didn’t chop down a cherry tree (plus he didn’t particularly want to revolt against England), Abraham Lincoln would have cheerfully not freed a single slave if it meant preserving the Union, Ghandi told his eighteen-year-old niece to sleep naked with him, Iraq didn’t have weapons of mass destruction, and Elvis is (probably) still dead.
- #1: Although humans appeared in history about 200,000 years ago, the earliest written records are only about 6,000 years old. That means that 97% of human history is unrecorded. Most of the other three percent could probably have stayed that way too.
![[image credit: Scattergun] http://tomdavidson92.blogspot.co.uk/](https://barbtaub.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/apathy-quotes-6.jpg)
[image credit: Scattergun]
So I hated history class. Hated it. I didn’t care about which order British monarchs or American presidents showed up in. I have absolutely no daily use for dates of wars or names of treaties. Basically, I loathed any form of history that forgot that the biggest part of the word is “story”.
And that’s why I love historical fiction and even biographies, where any historical facts you accidentally absorb are part of human stories and human reality. Those lessons from history that we’re doomed to repeat if we forget them? They aren’t about dates or treaties, they’re about the stories of real people and what happened to them.
In continuing his epic series, By the Hands of Men, author Roy M. Griffis uses his two protagonists to show us the world between the two World Wars, a Lost Generation cut off from its past, adrift in its present, and unsure of its future.
By the Hands of Men, Book Three: The Wrath of a Righteous Man
“And we thought the trenches were the pits of hell.”
“Hell does not appear to be limited in its ingenuity.”
Continuing the epic story of the “By Hands of Men” series, a man and a woman, torn apart by fate, forge their own destinies in the world after the Great War.
Escaping her enslavement in Russia, Charlotte Braninov fights to build a new life in London while the shadow of modern fanaticism looms over Europe.
Robert Fitzgerald faithfully serves the Crown in Africa until honor compels him to risk everything to overcome an ancient evil, only to discover that the greatest war rages within himself.
Book Title: By the Hands of Men, Book Three: The Wrath of a Righteous Man
Author: Roy M. Griffis
Genre: Epic Historical Fiction
Publisher: Amazon
Length: 335 pages
Release Date: May 16, 2016
Contact and Buy Links:
Amazon (US) | Amazon (UK) | Blog
My Review: 5 stars out of 5 for By the Hands of Men, Book Three: The Wrath of a Righteous Man by Roy M. Griffis
All you young people who served in the war. You are a lost generation…You have no respect for anything. You drink yourselves to death.”—Gertrude Stein
Hemingway credits Gertrude Stein with naming their generation. They were the ones who came of age during the first World War, the Great War. And what was lost was a sense of direction, of being able to draw on the past for identity and guidance.
Author Roy M. Griffis: Born in Texas City, TX, the son of a career Air Force meteorologist. Attended a variety of schools at all of the hot spots of the nation, such as Abilene, Texas and Bellevue, Nebraska. Sent to my grandparent’s house in Tucson, Arizona when things were tough at home. I was pretty damn lost, as my grandparents were largely strangers to me. My older brother, a more taciturn type, refused to discuss what was going on. Fortunately, like so many kids before me, I was rescued by literature. Or, at least, by fiction. In a tiny used bookstore that was just one block up from a dirt road, I discovered that some good soul had unloaded his entire collection of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ “John Carter of Mars” series in Ballantine Paperback. Moved by some impulse, I spent my RC Cola money on the first book, “A Princess of Mars.” I think what struck me was how these books were possessed of magic: they were able to transport me far from this dusty land of relatives who I didn’t know and relatives pretended not to know me to another dusty land of adventure, heroism, nobility, and even love. It was the first magic I’d encountered that wasn’t a patent fraud, and when I closed the stiff paperback with the lurid images on the cover, I decided it was the kind of magic I wanted to dedicate the rest of my life to mastering. And, thus, I was saved. Since then, I’ve never looked back. I’ve written poems, short stories (twice runner-up in the Playboy college fiction contest), plays (winning some regional awards back East and a collegiate Historical Play-writing Award), and screenplays. I’m a member of the WGAw, with one unproduced screenplay sold to Fox Television. Along the way, I’ve done the usual starving artist jobs. Been a janitor, a waiter, a clerk in a bookstore. I was the 61st Aviation Rescue Swimmer in the Coast Guard (all that Tarzan reading wasn’t wasted). I’m also not a bad cook, come to think of it. Currently, I’m a husband, father, and cat-owner. I’m an avid bicyclist and former EMT. I live in Southern California with my lovely wife. My friends call me “Griff,” my parents call me “Roy,” and my college-age son calls me “Dadman.” It’s a good life.
For American writers, this included a world of decadence, of the frivolous lifestyles of the very rich such as The Great Gatsby, but also the loss of innocence, and of the fiction that the American Dream was within everyone’s reach. For countries like England, it meant a generation literally lost, with over two million women more than men under age 45.
These are the themes of By the Hands of Men, Book Three: The Wrath of a Righteous Man, Roy M. Griffis’ epic World War I series, which sends lead characters Robert Fitzgerald and Charlotte Braninov on a search for connections to their pasts and their futures in a post-war world which has obliterated both.
This has become one of my favorite historical fiction series ever, but it is not a series where each book stands alone. If you haven’t had a chance to read the first two volumes, I urge you to do so, because the threads connecting them are carefully gathered and woven in. For example, in my previous review, I complained about a vignette in Book Two describing Charlotte’s interaction with a Jewish pawnbroker that I thought was only there to make a statement about aristocratic anti-semitism. In a similar way, as I was reading Robert’s various adventures in Shanghai and Africa, my first thought was that these were just padding to show what the rest of the world was like. I could not have been more wrong. Both threads play a critical role in this next volume.
In The Wrath of a Righteous Man, the Great War is over. Robert, recovered from typhoid, has left Shanghai, and is now bound for Africa. Charlotte escaped the the nightmare of death and torture that is the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia and—along with her few remaining friends—is on a boat bound for England. But she can’t allow herself to believe that the sailors around them have any genuine humanity, even when they take up collections to provide clothing and gifts for the tattered refugees. “It was almost enough to make the nurse believe in the possibility of the goodness of men. Almost.”
Instead, she puts her faith in the guns she hides under her dress, and makes almost a religious ceremony of cleaning them.
“Oddly, the thought of cleaning the pistols filled her with a joyous anticipation. And why not, she reasoned. They had saved her life and the lives of her companions. They gave her a kind of control over her existence which the Reds had conspired to take from her. No one would ever take that from her again.”
Back in England, Charlotte struggles to take care of her friends and connect with the people around her. But as fate sends her in search of the Jewish pawnbroker, Kamensky, she must travel to Paris. Despite leaving war and revolution behind, Charlotte imagines that she smells death and decay in the air everywhere she goes.
“Shoving her face into the opening, she inhaled deeply, and amid the scents of water and sewage and smoke, there was still the sickliness of decay. And why not? Millions, literal millions had perished in the Great War, many of them on this very soil. The cold, impersonal mechanism had done its mindless work, and beneath the mud, beneath the streets, the dead lay, mute testament to the blind machinery of the World.”
As Charlotte struggles to connect to the present, she slowly validates her affection and love for the people around her but at a cost: she must first release her ties to the people and memories that have gone before, including her memories of falling in love with Robert.
Meanwhile Robert has gone to Africa, where similar disillusionment awaits. He’s horrified to see the evidence of torture and death, the numbers of Africans with hands chopped off—standard punishment under the rule of King Leopold of Belgium. Robert, who saw his time in the trenches as supporting the “gallant” Belgians, is sickened by this further evidence that his war might not have been all that just. He’s sent from the Congo into Nigeria, where he serves with and comes to admire a former Boer soldier—and also learns first-hand about the atrocities on both sides of that war.
When his friend is killed by a sect of murderous religious zealots and slavers, Robert realizes that honor demands he take command of the native troops and fight their way through to punish the atrocities committed. After gruelling battles and losses, he finally succeeds in his campaign, capturing the leader of the slavers. But the final blow to Robert’s picture of himself as a soldier and an honorable man comes when British authorities release his captive because he is “useful” to them.
Robert takes shelter with friends of his fallen Boer comrade, and spends the next four years recovering.
“What can you do?” Uys asked him.
I can kill men, Robert thought. I can tie a cravat. I can pick a wine for dinner. “I can ride a horse,” he finally said.
In both Charlotte and Robert’s cases, their recovery of the ability to trust and even love is tied up with their relationship with animals. Charlotte and her friends have rescued a beautiful golden eagle and brought it with them from Russia. Robert works on a farm, first acquiring pets and then actively studying to become a veterinarian.
But other new forces again interfere. The fantastically wealthy American newspaper baron, Randolph Hearst, and his moviestar mistress, Marion Davies, come on safari and engage Robert’s veterinary services. He’s stunned to see their camp, lit up like “…something out of the Arabian Nights”, complete with generators, and guests donning formal dress for dinner.
The book ends on a pair of cliffhangers, as both Charlotte and Robert—still mourning their lost love—are faced with dangers from their past and both are forced to again move on.
I simply can’t say enough good things about this book. It’s a read for the long haul, with steady pacing, characters whose spirits are torn apart and slowly, painfully rebuilt. There is a supporting cast of three-dimensional characters who breath life and color into the tapestry. And there is the story itself, which is nothing more than an epic picture of a world between wars, as experienced on human scale through the two protagonists. The bare bones I’ve told here don’t begin to convey the wealth of detail and adventure that are woven into the twin stories of Robert and Charlotte, of what the war has cost, and of what they’ve each gained.
It’s an incredible achievement and my only complaint this time is that I want to know what happens next. I’m rooting for Robert and Charlotte, and my fingers are crossed that after all they’ve been through, the next and final book will bring resolution.
*I received this book for free from the publisher or author in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.*
Barb Taub 
I love historical fiction. It’s the human element that makes it work. A history teacher who understands that makes all the difference. A talking head who drones through dates and places killed many young minds interested in history.
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I completely agree. A teacher with passion—for any subject—is a lifelong gift to a student. I just never had one of those in history. But historical novelists have passion and some to spare!
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True statement.
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Indeed, Barb, historical novelists do have passion. I’m a shameless Phillipa Gregory fan and believe she deserves the career she is currently enjoying. I enjoyed your book review on The Wrath of a Righteous Man.
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Coldhand, you are so right. I probably gained my love of history because of the stories my father would tell me about the places we traveled through. And, now that you mention it, Barb, not a one of those was about genealogy. It was about “they found him with fifteen dead invaders at his feet” or “he loved that lady so much he walked across the continent to find her.” That made history live for me, and that’s the kind of storied I strive to write: ones that feel so real it’s as if you are living them.
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Absolutely. I come from a family with tons of stories. When they tell stories of my uncle getting ship sunk under him, or the Kamikaze attack he was in, it brings it to life. I knew them all well, but they never spoke of it. I know where the rockpile is where the last stagecoach robbery happened. So much better than rote facts.
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Oddly enough history sells itself as objective when, in fact,virtually all decisions made that shaped history are subjective and emotionally driven. The truth is elusive in that environment and not necessarily because there are lies (although there are) but primarily because everyone’s truth is different. Sometimes whole sections of history are covered up or ignored – for instance I was doing some research on wars and the human cost the other day. I came to realize that between 1850 and 1945,the Japanese Empire killed more humans in their expansionist actions than all who were killed in WW1 and WW2 combined. They killed over 20 million souls (estimate) and there is no mention of that at all in history books (just recently the Nanking massacres came to light wherein Japan killed between 200,000 to 300,000 non-combatant Chinese in a few months in 1937 for no strategic or military reason. Many in Japan still deny this occurred even though the evidence is inarguable ).
As a white of European descent I am ashamed of our treatment of First nations when we occupied North America – a land that was not even ours to take. We tortured, killed and committed genocide of First nations people. Again estimates show between 10 million and 100 million were killed. This was intentional to gain the land. That is not mentioned in history books. Even today our treatment of First Nations is abhorrent. The Nazis only killed 6 million Jews and we are all rightfully aghast at their hatred and violence – and yet our ancestors killed orders of magnitude more who were non-combatants, and it is not even in the history books let alone discussed.
This is a soap box topic of mine Barb. I naively believed all I was taught as being a right and fair representation of history. It wasn’t long before I started stumbling over some very significant omissions, misrepresentations, and outright lies. Now I believe very little of what I am told is our history. I do believe in the holocaust – that is one of few stories that seem to be true. Most of the rest is a fabrication by those who stand to most benefit from lies.
Great post Barb.
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As George Orwell said, history is written by the winners.
I also make no excuses for the atrocities committed against native peoples, and I don’t think it’s going too far to use the word holocaust. I might point out that approximately 90% of the native population was actually wiped out by European diseases such as smallpox. (Note: compare to the approx. 60% of Europeans who were killed by bubonic plague in the 14th century.) Horrific, yes. And more active atrocities were undeniably well-documented against the surviving native peoples. I don’t give the European conquerors a pass—there is little sign that they were unduly upset by the results of the plague, and quite possibly would have achieved similar results over time due to their advanced weapons and horses. However, the Jews killed in the WWII Holocaust didn’t die from a plague. They were deliberate murders.
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Paul, you sound like a man fresh from reading “Ecclesiastes.” The Preacher (allegedly Solomon) said “Wisdom increaseth sorrow.” In a way, that’s true, but it also increases work: the more we know, the more we must reflect on what is being presented to us as fact and discern for ourselves what is honest and true and accurate. And then we can decide what we should do about it, It requires very conscious living, which can be damned difficult in a busy life.
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Intriguing comment Griff. I like the idea of conscious living. Upon occasion I have run into topics that required the investment of time and work and understanding to get at the underlying truth. Anything less would not have produced understanding – so basically go big (applying large investment of time and energy) or go home (leave the topic knowing that it is not yours to understand). I have pondered this effect and have come to a few conclusions.
The underlying truth in a given topic or subject can lay at any level within the topic. For instance some large topics are simply the repetition of small logical units operating together. In that case, there is a repeating truth and a binding truth that holds the units of logic together. Like writing a large computer program (or fractals in nature) subroutines are written that are called whenever a recurring calculation is required. This constitutes a “shallow truth ” – one that lies close to the surface. Then there are subjects wherein the truth relates uniquely to every piece of the problem – there is little repetition. For instance it could be as time consuming to assemble 1,000 mouse traps as it is to rebuild a truck engine. Each mouse trap is a simple machine that employs simple truths. Each time one is completed, it is finished and the truth does not carry over to the next – which is just a repetition of the first – and so on. In a truck engine each part relates to the whole. There is a small amount of repetition from cylinder to cylinder, but each is necessary to the whole – the engine will not run (for long) if one is left undone. Each mouse trap will work just as well regardless of how many others are completed.
So you see the level of truth is different in different applications. Much like prime numbers, the bigger the uniquely organized problem is, the more likely it is to be composed of factors. In other words, prime numbers get further apart as they get larger – tending to infinite gaps. The bigger the number (read application) the bigger the chance that there are factors. As an intriguing aside, primes still tend to run in pairs at large numbers as well – although that doesn’t change the average distance between. http://www.wired.com/2014/12/mathematicians-make-major-discovery-prime-numbers/
And so it is with understanding in the real world. the deeper the truth is in a subject the more effort has to be applied to understand and the more complex (more internal interactions and inter-relationships) the subject. Much of what we use day to day is relatively easily understood with shallow and repeating truths. Sometimes the topic gets more complex and the truth lies deeper. When that happens we are forced to either leave it alone or dig deeper to find the truth – live consciously.
Fascinating comment Griff, thanks for letting me think here. 🙂
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Superb review of a phenomenal book! Well done!
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Thanks John!
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I have learned more history from historical fiction than history books. Mostly because the authors of the first do not need to appease anyone.
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And not only that, they see both the passion and the entertainment potential in history. I’m sure there are talented historians and teachers who also see that, but I was never lucky enough to have them as my teachers. I agree with you–I think I learned far more history from literature than from history texts.
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because, really, it’s all about the lives impacted.
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I used to teach History to 9 and 10 year olds, mainly Tudors. Every lesson was a storytelling, hopefully historically correct but mainly to catch their imagination. I taught other subjects too but my class told me they loved their history lessons best.
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I’m so sad that I never had a history teacher like you. On the other hand, it explains your flair for writing and reviewing.
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Thank you, Barb. I had a wonderful History teacher at my last school but earlier ones could be very boring.
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Reblogged this on poetry, photos and musings oh my! and commented:
History or Historical Fiction? I believe that Historical Fiction is closer to the truth…
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I have to agree with you! (And thanks so much for the reblog!)
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History is different depending on how it’s looked at and who looks at it… If you speak to anyone who works in a museum they’ll tell you it’s not about the facts, it’s about the people, it’s about the everyday lives of ordinary and extraordinary folk like you and me. We call it social history when we want to focus on the fun bits, the exciting bits, the people’s stories, and yet all history is social history – it’s about us – human beings, and how we lived and live now.
Sorry that is a bit of a rant but as someone who has worked for a number of years in a social history museum (called The Cardiff Story Museum – which tells the story of Cardiff through the stories of its people) I cannot emphasise enough just how much people get it wrong. History is not boring, it’s just that the people who talk about it may not be doing so in the most effective way, they may be focusing on the facts, rather than the people.
And historical fiction is a brilliant invention – a way for us to enjoy it to the utmost, submerging ourselves into the lives of those who went before us.
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Both personally and as a parent, it’s always a thrill to go to a museum that gets it right—one that presents history as stories instead of dates and facts. Clearly, the Cardiff Story Museum is one of those. I’ve just added it to my ‘must see’ list!
http://www.cardiffstory.com/
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I think history is something you’re either nuts about (like wot I am) or that doesn’t interest you much. I’m mostly interested in sociological history, because the rulers of the countries were, are, always have been and always will be, a bunch of self-serving ?!!*s who don’t give a stuff about anything apart from maintaining their own way of life. I mean all royalty and all politicians, btw. And I strongly believe that the world has always been ruled by a very few (and, again, always will be). How the ordinary people lived, though, is something else. And the architecture, the trends in education, literature, the lot of women, technological progress, etc etc. I’ve learned most of what I know from histfic, too 🙂
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Thanks for this, Barb. I’ve learned so much history from reading historical fiction. So now I’m trying to write some myself!
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