Welcome to literary fiction on NTS. I'm Carrie Plitt, here as always with my co-host Octavia Bright. Hi, Octavia. Hi, Carrie. How are you doing this morning? I'm great, darling. How are you? Hopped up on caffeine as usual.

Yay.

Having a good time.

Also having good time because I'm here recording the show with you. That's always the best thing in my week. Month. Yes. I wish it was a week. While we see each other more than that. We're real friends. We are. For all of our concerns, listeners. So on this month's show, we're talking about the historical novel, from Ivanhoe to Wolf Hall.

What do we look for in art about the past? Do historical novels have to be true to history?

I, for one, am very excited to tackle these questions, especially because we have a wonderful

author guest in today to help us do so. Her name is Essia Dugian, and she's here to talk about her third novel, Washington Black, which was shortlisted this year for the Man Booker Prize, and we were actually at the party. We're very involved in the literary scene. We were at a party. Yeah, we were at a party. We were not at the party. No, we weren't. Yeah, sorry.

I don't know why I'm bragging about this. Anyway, we're really looking forward to having Esi on. Do you want to tell us a little more about her and about Washington Black as well? I really, really do. Essia Dugian lives in Victoria, British Columbia in Canada. She is the author of the Second Life of Samuel Tyne and Half Blood Blues, which won the

Scotia Bank Giller Prize and was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize, the Governor General's

Literary Award and the Rogers Writers' Trust Prize and the Orange Prize, many prizes.

I should have read that sentence properly before.

Her latest novel, Washington Black,

is the story of George Washington Black, a gifted artist born a slave on a plantation in 1830s

Bermuda and the fantastic and surprising course of his life, which takes him from the Arctic to

London to the deserts of Morocco. It's a really fabulous tale. Yeah, it's been a wonderful

companion to me this last week and I really can't wait to talk to her about it. Yeah, me too. I've been thrilled to read it. Yeah, it's been a wonderful companion to me this last week, and I really can't wait to talk

to her about it.

Yeah, me too.

I've been thrilled to read it.

So today we'll talk to Essie about Washington Black, more generally about historical fiction,

and finally, we will be giving our book recommendations.

So if you're in the mood for the remembrance of things past, stay right here with us for the

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