I’ve long loved stories that are set in the past, but it wasn’t until late in the process of writing Where Light Meets Water that I began to think of my novel as ‘historical fiction’. I wanted the style to feel modern, and to be driven by character and imaginative flight rather than historical fact. The best historical writing, however, balances research and imagination; they become partners in a necessary and rhythmic dance, where one inspires the other, then vice versa. Here are just a few of my favourite historical novels:

From that immortal first line – ‘So now get up’ – to the way she throws us into scenes and demands we swim, Mantel was a writer of extraordinary literary talent and a peerless researcher. The humanity she brings to the complicated 16th-century character of Thomas Cromwell, the depth of insight, and the precision of her language are breathtaking. 

Set in Italy in World War II, the story of the fire-ravaged English patient reverberates with dramatic effect, but it’s the quiet, tender love between Kip, a Sikh sapper, and Hana, a Canadian nurse, that lingers with me. Ondaatje manages a wonderful balance between impressionism and detail, and I often revisit to learn how he pulls it off.

My favourite of Jones’s many outstanding novels, Sixty Lights tells a gorgeous story of Victorian-era woman Lucy Strange – curious, independent and passionate about the invention of photography. Jones’s always-luminous prose reverberates with insight and fascination for the deep complexities of our loves, griefs and inner worlds. 

Beloved had a profound impact on me when I first read it in my early twenties, and continues to stun. The inventiveness of Morrison’s first-person narration by a ghost and the extraordinary beauty of her language bring Sethe’s story of enslavement in 19th-century Kentucky and its legacy to life with stark and resonant humanity and horror.

An astounding historical saga spanning four generations of a Korean family. Beginning in Busan, Korea, 1910, and ending in the vastly different world of 1980s Tokyo, Japan, Pachinko deftly depicts the impact of Japanese occupation and the erasure of Korean identity through Sunja’s moving personal story of survival.

Catherine Chidgey’s writing is akin to a piece of music: sonorous and rhythmic. Set in Nazi Germany, the exquisitely crafted The Wish Child is told through the eyes of a child narrator and manages beauty and humour, despite unravelling a story of horror and dealing very seriously with disturbing history and urgent themes.

Filling in the gaps in the historical record, O’Farrell gives life to the imagined point of view of Anne or Agnes Hathaway, the wife of Shakespeare, and the story of their son, Hamnet, who died as a child. Hamnet is lyrical and rich with domestic detail, and the early scene with Agnes and the ‘tutor’ in the apple store had me hooked.

Set in 1860s Queensland, the story of Chinese siblings Ying and Lai Yue is tender, meticulously researched and gives breath to rarely heard voices. The fate of Lai Yue left me utterly heartbroken as he attempts to adapt and survive within the hostile and racist social environment of colonial Australia.