Fiction based in first half of 19th Century

I thought Jakes wrote about the Revolution.

He certainly had the background to get his facts straight.

http://www.johnjakes.com/savannah_rgg.htm

What about "Burr" by Gore Vidal?

The state of Michigan demanded its prospective English teachers all take a course usually titled, "American Literature: 1830-65." THis could be taken at any level from sophomore survey to graduate seminar. The courses cover Moby Dick, Little Women, the Transcendentalists, Uncle Tom's Cabin, Edgar Allen Poe, etc. Why not read the originals?

BTW -- Gore Vidal actually wrote about some of his own ancestors in his historical fiction. A late friend of mine was distantly related to Vidal.

Fiction based on first half of Nineteenth Century
Gore Vidal is an excellent author, and may be what I am looking for. As to reading original Nineteenth Century authors, all too often the language of the novel is quite stilted & formal and is not the way anyone really spoke. By the way, is Gore Vidal distantly related to Stephan Girard?

What makes you think people didn't speak in the way the 19th C novelists wrote? How many novelists do you know? They all talk exactly the way they write, which is why I often say that far too many novelists have only one book in them which they rewrite over and over.

I always thought that 19th C novels were easy reading which is why children -- when I was a child -- were given them to read.

Why not just read history books?