Caleb Carr did that in The Alienist and its sequel. The first time around, it wasn't so bad. Second time, when he tossed in Clarence Darrow and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, it got more annoying.

One exception, and it fits your rule of "further back is easier" is Gore Vidal's Creation. The whole point if the novel is the main character gets to meet prominent religious figures and philosophers. He is a Persian, grandson of Zoraster, and friend of Xerxes (not Alexander as I previously said). As a Persian ambassador, he meets the Buddha and the early Jains in India, Confucius and leading Taoists in China. He lives long enough to meet Socrates in Greece. Vidal has to make him live very long and travel very widely to meet all these people. And he meets famous kings and generals and so on associated with all the same figures. But Vidal is,among other things making a point - that all these religious and philosophical revolutions were in historical terms happening at the same time. They were happening in almost a single human lifetime. Vidal spends a lot of time making his main character a real person who would plausibly be interested in such travel and seek out leading religious figures, and setting up plot twists and turns to let it happen. It helps that it is made clear from the beginning that this will be picturesque tale in which the main character will accomplish little but meet and reflect on fascinating people and historical circumstances.

ARGH-- I lost half the list somehow!

ARGH!

Typo, doing it to make a point is one thing. It just irks me when an author feels compelled to drag in just about every prominent person in that time/place and not only have them appear in the story, but be a prominent part of the story. (Historical fiction about famous people is an exception for me, but that's me.) Give me the same kind of feeling I get with Laurell K. Hamilton and her Anita Blake. Mary Sue'd to the max.

I just finished Kurt Anderson's Heyday, and it has a fair amount of "Oh, look who we ran into!" But the novel's basically constructed to be a encyclopedia of 1848, so the plot is thin and built on unlikely coincidences. I think it was kind of like the Vidal book -- if it was meant to be realistic, the cameos would be the least of its problems.

The only bit that really bugged me was when they were in Illinois and start talking about a politician/lawyer, and it's obviously Lincoln but they don't say his name for most of the conversation, and it's too cute by half. Lincoln himself doesn't "appear" though.

Vidal is a novelist, not just an explorer of ideas. The main character is genuinely interesting if not always pleasant. He survives truly dangerous situations - both through luck, and through occasional exercise of intelligence. He is in danger from his (literal) witch of a mother, from the Harem and the court Eunuchs in Persia. He survives dangerous journeys, and deadly wars (civil and not) and intrigue in India, China, and in Greece as well.

This weekend, a headline said "Norbert Batters Mexican Coast." What does it say that my first thought was dragon, not hurricane?

Norbert?

And we already have Omar building up steam too. (Or so I heard.)

What's the "P" name this year?

Palin

Hee.