I’ve been trying to dig up articles on this and haven’t come up with many good or conclusive sources.
So I’m in charge of adapting a book that follows a character over a few events in history. One of the early events occurs around 1895/1900s in New Mexico and depicts the main character’s family being killed on their ranch by Apache raiders.
The book was written a while ago and there are some aspects I need to consider for more modern sensitivities and this is one of those events I want to make sure is accurate so that I don’t depict history in a false way or poorly represent a culture.
I could very easily change it to “bandits” that killed his family, but if there’s historical context to it, it might be more faithful to the story to keep it.
How accurate are these raids?
2nd question, as a historian, SHOULD these events be changed in the adaptation of the book?
The book is fiction but has historical events and characters throughout, similar to what you might have seen in Forest Gump.
Thanks for your advice and info!
Hi there - we're happy to approve your question related to your creative project, and we are happy for people to answer. However, we should warn you that many flairs have become reluctant to answer questions for aspiring novelists and the like, based on past experience: some people working on creative projects have a tendency to try to pump historians for trivia while ignoring the bigger points they were making, while others have a tendency to argue with historians when the historical reality does not line up with what's needed for a particular scene or characterization. Please respect the answers of people who have generously given you their time, even if it's not always what you want to hear.
Additionally, as amazing as our flair panel is, we should also point out that /r/AskHistorians is not a professional historical consultation service. If you're asking a question here because you need vital research for a future commercial product such as a historical novel, you may be better off engaging a historical consultant at a fair hourly rate to answer these questions for you. We don't know what the going rate for consultancy work would be in your locality, but it may be worth looking into that if you have in-depth or highly plot-reliant questions for this project. Some /r/AskHistorians flairs could be receptive to working as a consultant in this way. However, if you wish for a flair here to do this work for you, you will need to organize this with them yourselves.
For more general advice about doing research to inform a creative project, please check out our Monday Methods post on the subject.