Books featuring the Burg

A sometimes reader recently asked for a bit of suggested reading, namely books that take place in Williamsburg. I must admit that my reading related to Williamsburg includes your standard Insiders' Guide to... and a trunk full of books about the place where I hang my scarf (I need the scarf to keep me warn inside, not out) before heading for home. I have other books I'm reading just now, but I am absolutely adding a few of the titles I found for this post to my reading list.

I have been very tempted to purchase the Savannah series of books. Who is Savannah you ask? No, she is not Felicity of American Girl fame's friend, but they do seem to be going for a similar target audience. Savannah is a young london squirrel who now (or then since the books are set in the 18th century) makes her home in Williamsburg. Everyone wants to live in Williamsburg. The fact that in one of the books, Savannah is meeting pirates is almost too much excellence.

There do seem to be a lot of books for younger readers set in Williamsburg (all of that history or something, I guess), so if you are bringing yours or want to leave them with a book about where you are heading off to you have a number of options. In addition to Felicity and Savannah there is also A Haunting in Williamsburg and Willi Gets a History Lesson in Virginia's Historic Triangle as well as others I have simply not been fortunate enough to stumble upon...yet.

Novelist Christopher Bram is an alumnus of the College of William and Mary, which he has used as a setting in some of his work including Surprising Myself and Exiles in America. Bram's book that will ring a bell for many of you is Father of Frankenstein, the basis for the film Gods and Monsters.

Williamsburg has also set the mood in at least two romance novels: Lynne Hayworth's Autumn Flame (Zebra Books, 2001) and Corinne Everett's Loving Lily (Zebra, 2001). Those are not terribly exciting titles, but I'm neither a romance genre publisher nor an author so what do I really know on the subject?

Winning the prize for Best Author's Name That I Really Wonder If It Is Real is Taffy Cannon's Guns and Roses: A Modern Murder Mystery set in Colonial Williamsburg. The book's name is excellent as well, but Savannah's books are going to take that prize home this year.

There was also a Williamsburg series of historical novels by Elswyth Thane published in the 1940s and 1950s, but apparently only the first two are actually set in Billburg.

Finally, there is M. G. McManus's romance trilogy Nicholson Street, Francis Street, and Duke of Gloucester Street (feel free to pretend you are a local and call it DOG Street-I won't tell) that relate the adventures of archaeologist Charles Dalton, who stumbles on a portal to the past. If you spend any time in the Historic Area while in Williamsburg, you will recognize those street names. (Note: Feel free to ask a tour guide while at Colonial Williamsburg about the portal.)

There are also a couple volumes of The Ghosts of Williamsburg, so if you would like to create your own Halloween ghost tour that might be a step in the right direction. You can pick up The Ghosts on Amazon or at the College of William and Mary Barnes and Noble Bookstore on DOG Street.