That is until she meets pugilist patron George Dryer and discovers her true calling—fighting bare knuckles in the prize rings of Bristol. Description: After four harrowing years on the Western Front, Tom Sherbourne returns to Australia and takes a job as the lighthouse keeper on Janus Rock, nearly half a day’s journey from the coast. Lavinia herself never speaks a word. In the early 1900s, teenaged Sunja, the adored daughter of a crippled fisherman, falls for a wealthy stranger at the seashore near her home in Korea. Each writer has to decide where to draw the line between a history textbook and a modern story. Description: Beginning in the 1950s in a poor but vibrant neighborhood on the outskirts of Naples, Ferrante’s four-volume story spans almost sixty years, as its protagonists, the fiery and unforgettable Lila, and the bookish narrator, Elena, become women, wives, mothers, and leaders, all the while maintaining a complex and at times conflictual friendship. Romance novels sometimes have a bad reputation, don’t they? Cora and Caesar’s first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. In the Greek camp, another woman watches and waits for the war’s outcome: Briseis. To his surprise, the eccentric Christopher Wilde turns out to be a naturalist, explorer, inventor, and abolitionist. After Kerr’s untimely death last year, it was announced that one more book would be released in the series: Metropolis, which takes us back to Bernie Gunther’s early days on the job, and concludes a 14-book-dive into the worst parts of 20th century history. Inspired by the 1970 Bhola cyclone, in which half a million-people perished overnight, the structure of this riveting novel mimics the storm itself. Richly told and profoundly moving, Pachinko is a story of love, sacrifice, ambition, and loyalty. Thank you for signing up! The Night Women, as they call themselves, have long been plotting a slave revolt, and as Lilith comes of age they see her as the key to their plans. I’m a huge fan of historical crime fiction, especially those books that manage to tell a compelling story while still immersing the reader in the thoughts and opinions of the time. Life is hell for all the slaves, but especially bad for Cora; an outcast even among her fellow Africans, she is coming into womanhood—where even greater pain awaits. Into this impasse steps Thomas Cromwell: a wholly original man, a charmer and a bully, both idealist and opportunist, astute in reading people, and implacable in his ambition. The Butterfly Cabinet is based on a true story, the death of Mary Helen Montagu aged three, who died at the hands of her mother in 1892 in Portstewart. Because of this, I believe historical fiction books are also those that simply couldn’t have happened in any other time or place. As a historical writer I stay safely in the modern era, a time from the Tudors onwards where there was some law and order, where parliament ruled with the monarch. Read 8 987 reviews from the world's largest community for readers. An action-packed adventure, an epic love story, a marvelously conceived and executed page-turner, Miller’s monumental debut novel has already earned resounding acclaim from some of contemporary fiction’s brightest lights—and fans of Mary Renault, Bernard Cornwell, Steven Pressfield, and Colleen McCullough’s Masters of Rome series will delight in this unforgettable journey back to ancient Greece in the Age of Heroes. With the pace and suspense of a thriller and prose that has been compared to Graham Greene and Saul Bellow, The Sympathizer is a sweeping epic of love and betrayal. There is a real sense of the cultured people of Inverness reveling in the goings-on in Culduie. In The Aeneid, Vergil’s hero fights to claim the king’s daughter, Lavinia, with whom he is destined to found an empire. K.J. Description: Spanning much of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the novel follows the fortunes of the extraordinary Whittaker family as led by the enterprising Henry Whittaker—a poor-born Englishman who makes a great fortune in the South American quinine trade, eventually becoming the richest man in Philadelphia. Time Period and Setting: Late 1700s, Jamaica. Description: In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. The two find solace, developing a bond that keeps their spirits alive. Find more of our favorite historical fiction authors writing today here. You most likely didn’t see your favorites in this list, but that’s okay! And of course, tastes vary from individual to individual: from readers who love scalpel-waving forensic pathologists to those who cringe at anything more gruesome than a game of Cluedo. The Maddoxes have bourbon in their blood—and blood in their bourbon. Beautifully written, the character of Harriet seems cold, distant, and like the jurors, we don’t sympathize when she struggles with prison life. The vast forests, the walled towns, the castles, and the monasteries become a familiar landscape. Find our best selection and offers online, with FREE Click & Collect or UK delivery. It asks questions about the effects of brutality and emotional neglect throughout, as well as exploring the murders themselves. Ahmad is a jinni, a being of fire born in the ancient Syrian desert, trapped in an old copper flask, and released in New York City, though still not entirely free. In the following list, you’ll see books with fantastical elements, mystery, and romance. The story of this tragic episode unfolds in a sequence of interconnected chapters as the victims and the bereaved encounter suppression, denial, and the echoing agony of the massacre. The winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, as well as seven other awards, The Sympathizer is the breakthrough novel of the year. One will marry an Englishman and lead a life of comfort in the palatial rooms of the Cape Coast Castle. Once the inheritance is secured, Maud will be disposed of—passed off as mad, and made to live out the rest of her days in a lunatic asylum. Antonia Hodgson crafts the living hell of the Marshalsea’s worse punishments. The Best Detective Novel Series 7. Fans of the TV show True Blood will surely enjoy the Southern Gothic Sookie Stackhouse series, which... Gone Girl. While some of it may be remembered from a lived experience, a lot of a historical fiction novel’s conception comes from research. Daniel Pitt Mystery Series . Despite the melodrama, the characters are believable and their motives are understandable. Charles's steamy Sin of the City series is a blend of romance and mystery.Lodging-house keeper Clem Talleyfer feels a pull toward one of his transient guests, Rowley Green. Life is hell for all the slaves, but especially bad for Cora; an outcast even among her fellow Africans, she is coming into womanhood—where even greater pain awaits. This 1951 novel is the only one on this list of the greatest classic detective novels to take the form of a historical mystery: Tey’s 1950s policeman investigates a 15 th-century crime, or rather crimes, as he looks into the life of King Richard III and his alleged guilt over the murder of the Princes in the Tower. French’s novels focus on character development but the mysteries are also compelling. But her decision to abandon her home, and to reject her son’s powerful father, sets off a dramatic saga that will echo down through the generations. While you can enjoy this simply as a crime puzzle to solve, it takes the reader back to a time before modern medicine when doctors went from an autopsy to women giving birth, spreading fatal infections without knowing it. Armed with a legal education from Oxford, Perveen also has a tragic personal history that makes women’s legal rights especially important to her. Once again, Julie Otsuka has written a spellbinding novel about identity and loyalty, and what it means to be an American in uncertain times. Ruth Downie meticulously builds the world, not of sunny Roman courtyards and temples but a working regiment in an occupied country. The Evening and the Morning: The Prequel to The…. The Women’s Murder Club is perhaps his most successful series, with 19 (soon-to-be-20) novels about a group of five women who band together to solve homicide mysteries. It is the story of Lilith, born into slavery on a Jamaican sugar plantation at the end of the eighteenth century. Perveen is suspicious, especially since one of the widows has signed her form with an X—meaning she probably couldn’t even read the document. When the communist-backed army from the north invades her home, sixteen-year-old Haemi Lee, along with her widowed mother and ailing brother, is forced to flee to a refugee camp along the coast. The Hound of the Baskervilles is one of the best mystery books ever written; it’s certainly one of the most-read books of all time. Time Period and Setting: 1960s-1970s, U.S. By Sarah Blake. It is an event that will lead to an illicit liaison and tragedies accidental and intentional, exposing “big things [that] lurk unsaid” in a country drifting dangerously toward unrest. The twists and turns are sudden and surprising, and ultimately satisfying. Now, who’s ready to travel time and space with me? Description: It’s 1843, and Grace Marks has been convicted for her involvement in the vicious murders of her employer and his housekeeper and mistress. And, with that, read on for the best historical fiction books for adults. Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. The Best Historical Fiction Books. Tom, who keeps meticulous records and whose moral principles have withstood a horrific war, wants to report the man and infant immediately. It’s a book that is terrifying and gruesome in places, but had me hoping and hoping that the only witness to the murders—and probably the next victim – isn’t the battered skull in Julia’s garden. In their last remaining weeks together, we learn Shahryar’s history, in a village on the Bay of Bengal, where a poor fisherman and his wife are preparing to face a storm of historic proportions. The Sympathizer is a blistering exploration of identity and America, a gripping espionage novel, and a powerful story of love and friendship. The question of culpability is explored, with ideas of madness and “moral imbecility” put forward to explain his terrible actions. A compassionate, subtle and gripping novel. With a vibrant cast of vividly realized characters, Moloka’i is the true-to-life chronicle of a people who embraced life in the face of death. Since we also have some fantastic lists on other historical fiction sub-genres, I’ve refrained from including as many historical fiction books on the following topics (though some definitely do appear). 100 Must-Read Books of U.S. Sherlock Holmes. Description: Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. In the midst of a violent student uprising in South Korea, a young boy named Dong-ho is shockingly killed. To this isolated island, where the supply boat comes once a season, Tom brings a young, bold, and loving wife, Isabel. Historical Fiction, 100 Must-Read Medieval Historical Fiction, 50 Must-Read Historical Fiction Books For Kids, 50 Must-Read Historical Fiction Picture Books, 28 Fabulous Works of Queer Historical Fiction. It is hoped that her strong personality will temper the young ruler’s heretical desire to forsake Egypt’s ancient gods. Read 6 157 reviews from the world's largest community for readers. Here are 10 great history books that drop brilliant knowledge. They are the ultimate page-turners. Number of books: 190 books in the primary mystery series (and even more in the Hardy Boys Casefiles Series, the Clues Brothers, and various other Hardy-related spinoffs). Revka, a village baker’s wife, watched the murder of her daughter by Roman soldiers; she brings to Masada her young grandsons, rendered mute by what they have witnessed. He’s a great character, mingling with the powerful at court despite thirteen years as a monk he has great understanding of emotion. Therefore, if you are looking to watch a Turkish TV series with English subtitles to know historical aspects of Turkish people and culture, then it could be the best choice for you. The story is set entirely in the lowest layers of society from servants to the slums to the asylum. Help us grow that list of 678 of the best historical fiction books by sharing your favorites with us on social. When a fleet of Trojan ships sails up the Tiber, Lavinia decides to take her destiny into her own hands. Description: England in the 1520s is a heartbeat from disaster. A great novel can transport you to the past and present. Sacred Wilderness explores the lives of four women of different eras and backgrounds who come together to restore foundation to a mixed-up, mixed-blood woman–a woman who had been living the American dream, and found it a great maw of emptiness. Description: A true triumph of voice and storytelling, The Book of Night Women rings with both profound authenticity and a distinctly contemporary energy. It is a classic narrative about Africa’s cataclysmic encounter with Europe as it establishes a colonial presence on the continent. 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