If it is a story then what has that got to do with my teaching history? Well to begin with the best historical fiction is well researched. Good writers like Jill Paton Walsh take their research very seriously. She has commented that, "the writer may invent characters, conversations, circumstances, but if the book is a good one, the invention will all be with the grain of the known historical evidence, and will illuminate." Reading good historical fiction can be very valuable for teaching history.