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Newest Historical Fiction Reviews (view source)
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[[Category:Historical Fiction|*]]
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|rating=5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=''Gracetown, Florida. June 1950. After a scuffle with a white boy, twelve year-old Robbie Stephens Jr is sentenced to six months at the Gracetown School for Boys, otherwise known as the Reformatory. It was a bit slow'' was probably my Mam's worst condemnation a place with a brutal and dark reputation. But the segregated reformatory is a chamber of film… but Ihorrors, haunted by the boys that have died there. In order to survive the school governor and his Funhouse, Robert must enlist the help of the school'm going s ghosts – only they have their own motivations...|isbn=1803366532}} {{Frontpage|author=Katherine Howe|title=A True Account|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to forgive her for not appreciating slownesslive with a family who run an inn, because it was she that got me into appreciating westernsand being made to work there from a young age. Of course When she preferred hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates in the all-action kindtown, but through watching those with her, I started she decides to go and watch . Enthralled and enjoy horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's death at the longhands of two vicious pirates. She hides away, slowso that they don't find and kill her too, ones and then to appreciate the back-drop escape them completely she runs away to all of that action… sea, dressing as a boy and then somewhere along joining the line I got interested in what might really have happened: notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy. not just She soon finds herself in the West but the whole thick of what became the U.S. things when there is a mutiny on board, and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the early days of settlementocean waves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1408844303</amazonuk>0861547438
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mary GibsonSarah Marsh|title=Jam and Roses: The Lives and Loves A Sign of 1920s Factory GirlsHer Own
|rating=3.5
|genre=Historical General Fiction|summary=The year is 1923 and 'jam-girl' Millie Colman is eagerly awaiting the arrival After a bout of scarlet fever as a letter inviting child, Ellen Lark loses her family to go 'hopping' in Kenthearing. The annual trip provides desperately needed respite from the oppressive atmosphere at home, as well as Suddenly plunged into a much-needed dose world of fresh air and open spacesilence, everything about her life changes. For Millie, Living in a time when the invitation symbolises escape; albeit for use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a few precious weeks of the year. Life in the Colman household school where she is uncomfortabletaught to lip read, to say the leastbut physically restrained from signing. Millie and her two sisters bicker constantly and the whole family live From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the shadow of deaf and using a drunken father who is prone to violent ragessystem called Visible Speech. Unfortunately for Millie At the same time, this year's hopping trip Bell is anything but an escapeworking on other inventions and ideas, when she makes and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a foolish decision which will have dire repercussions for the whole familycomplicated tangle of espionage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781855927</amazonuk>1035401614
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Claire North
|title=House of Odysseus
|rating=5
|genre= Literary Fiction
|summary= ''What could matter more than love?''
The follow-up to the excellent ''Ithaca'' picks up a few months after where we left off. In the palace of Odysseus, with delicate care Queen Penelope continues to rule without her husband, who sailed to war at Troy and then by divine intervention never returned home. As ever she remains surrounded by suitors vying for the throne of the Western Isles. Having survived – politically and physical – the chaotic storm that Clytemnestra brought to Ithaca's shores, Queen Penelope is on the brink of a fragile peace. One that shatters however with the return of Orestes, King of Mycenae, and his sister Elektra, seeking refuge.|isbn=0356516075}}{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ian RossB0C7J9D21B|title=The War at the Edge of the World: Twilight of Empire: Book One A Captive in Algiers (Rome RebornMuhammed Amalfi Mysteries)|author=A J Lewis|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Centurion Aurelius Castus has risen through the ranks from the crack legions of the Danube but now finds himself in a Roman army on the very edge of the world – 4th century BritainWhen we first meet our hero, near Eboracum. Although his men are kept name is Ettore and he lives at battle fitness, his latest mission is one The House of peaceBeautiful Swallows. He must take Idyllic as this might sound, it's a cohort to escort an envoy on a visit to the barbarian Pictsbordello and Ettore's mother died when he was born. The local tribes are He's not been short of mothers, though - but for someone of his background in the process of picking a new leader andlate-eighteenth-century Amalfi, as the areait's future is resting on it, the Romans want difficult to influence the choice with diplomacyobtain decent employment. However not everyone has been honest The stint working with Castus; people as well as situations the preparation of anchovies didn't work out and bastards are not all they seemconsidered bad luck on fishing boats. Castus must depend on his own initiative Ettore was nothing if not resourceful - and determined - and ability to survive it was not long before he had a successful business as he soon realises he can trust no onea guide for visitors. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784081124</amazonuk>He was even saving some money.
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Erin KnightleyEssie Fox|title=The Earl I AdoreFascination
|rating=4
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Poor Sophie Wembley has been placed in The Victorian era is incredibly over-romanticised as a desperate situation thanks to her sister Penelopesetting for historical fiction (matched only, perhaps, who by the Second World War) which has eloped with the often led to more than a few writers mishandling it. There'hired help'. Once news s such a glut of media set in the scandal reaches the gossip-mongers of era that the hallmarks we'ton', Sophie and her family will be ousted from polite society and her hopes of finding an eligible husband will be ruined. It is therefore up ve come to Sophie's scheming mother to persuade her associate with it are familiar to snare herself a man before the gossip becomes public knowledgepoint of being cliched, hackneyed even. Time All this is clearly of the essence and when simply to illustrate that it comes would be an easy thing to suitable husbands, Sophie knows only one man will do: the handsome Earl of Evansleighpoorly. But despite that, for whom she has been harbouring a something about it still grabs me – and something about this book'tendre' for the past years description did as well.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0349405441</amazonuk>1914585526
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tracey WarrNicole Jarvis|title=The Viking HostageA Portrait in Shadow|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Sigrid and her brothers are taken from their native Norseland and sold as slaves separately. Sigrid then begins her life alone as maid to Aina, daughter of Ademar, Viscount of Segur in Limoges. Her life could be a lot worse. Sigrid's pagan beliefs could condemn her to a tough time in Christian France but she's fallen on her feet, forming a close friendship with Aina, albeit a servile one. Meanwhile elsewhere in the region, Adalmode, daughter of the Viscount I want all of Limoges is about Florence to become a marriage pawn in a power struggle. Although she loves her family, she disagrees with their choice and has another in mind – one of her fatherknow my name''s prisoners. This is a tough world where love takes second place to survival and having it all is generally not an option compatible with staying alive.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907605592</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{Frontpage
|author=Thomas D Lee
|title=Perilous Times
|rating=3
|genre= Fantasy
|summary= ''Hate is the path of least resistance''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Daisy WaughG K Holloway|title=Honeyville|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=The story is told by Dora Whitworth, a call girl in one of the most exclusive brothels in Trinidad, Colorado. At the time, the town was the only place in In the West where prostitution was legal and it was infamous for its red-light district. Dora’s voice rings true and her life is convincingly described. The sumptuous brothel in Plum Street, with its smells Shadows of perfume and disinfectant, is as claustrophobic as a prison and Phoebe, the madam, particularly chilling.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007431775</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Joanna Hickson|title=Red Rose, White RoseCastles
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Cecily Neville, daughter We begin after the momentous battle in 1066 and on the day of Ralph, Earl William of Westmorland and Joan Beaufort, puts her obligations above all else which is why she marries Richard Plantagenet, third Duke Normandy's coronation as King of York and her fatherEngland. William's wardposition is not secure and the new king has many challenges. Together they will start Imposing authority through a royal line that will go down coronation is important. And William is right to worry. While the centuries but not without painprevious king, Harold, conflict is dead and, the likelihood of coursemore pitched battles is over, the Wars rebels are stirring and much of the Rosescountry does not wish to recognise a new overlord. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0007447019</amazonuk>1800422466
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=3949666079
|title=Noema
|author=Dael Akkerman
|rating=4.5
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''This is a story about some things that happened to me about twelve thousand years ago.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Chris Priestley1529125898|title=The Last of the SpiritsGodmersham Park|author=Gill Hornby
|rating=5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Everyone knows Charlotte, Emily and Anne. Not many know that this famous trio ''If it were not for the casual dereliction of literary sisters also had a brother, Patrick Branwell Brontë, born the year after Charlotte and a year before Emily. Like his sisters, he had literary ambitions: he wrote juvenile stories, poems and translations from the Greek; he also trained as a painter (you have most likely seen his famous painting of his sisters). Again like his sisters, howeverodd gentleman's duty, he was destined there would no women to die youngteach well-bred daughters at all.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857522876</amazonuk>}}''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Erin KnightleyMelissa Fu |title=The Baron Next DoorPeach Blossom Spring
|rating=3.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary= I loved the prelude to Peach Blossom Spring, a short chapter entitled ''Origins''. Unfortunately it is the only truly poetic part of a book that I expected more from. Covering Chinese history from 1938 to 2005 as viewed through one family's perspective. When their home city is set ablaze during the war with Japan, a young mother (Meilin) and her four-year-old son (Renshu) are among those who flee. The story follows them on their journey across China, and in Renshu's case eventually to America.
|isbn=1472277538
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1916072038
|title=The House in the Hollow (The Talbot Saga)
|author=Allie Cresswell
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Charity is hoping to enjoy a relaxing break We meet part of the Talbot family in Yorkshire in Bath, attending the music festival with her beloved grandmother, Lady EffingtonNovember 1811. Charity doesn't just love music, she ''lives'' music; it is an intrinsic part of her very being Twenty-seven-year-old Jocelyn Talbot and she is never happier than when playing her latest compositions on her pianoforte. She cannot understand why anyone would hate musicmother have travelled in some discomfort from their home at Ecklington, so when her new neighbour Baron Cadgwith turns up on her doorstep, demanding that she keep to the ''infernal racket to a minimum'', she declares war on house in the insufferably rude Baron next doorhollow. The result two women are angry with each other and Jocelyn is a light-hearted well aware of her mother's strengths and sweet Regency romance that sees the most unlikely pair begin to bond, despite their differences.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0349405417</amazonuk>}}weaknesses:
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Barbara EwingAnnabel Abbs|title=The Petticoat MenLanguage of Food|rating=45
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=In 1871 Ernest Boulton (aged 22) and Frederick Park (aged 23) were arrested in London; an arrest that shook society all Eliza Acton is a poet who has never had the way slightest inclination to the topboil an egg. Their crime? They dressed as womenWhen tasked with writing a cookery book, which hinted at homosexualityshe recruits Ann Kirby, then a crime that carried local woman with a heinous prison tarifftroubled home life. Their infamous trial was watched closely by society because Stella and Fanny (as Together, they were known when frocked) performed regularly at house parties test, craft, refine and soirees attended by reshape the world of domestic cookery, reinventing the higher echelons recipe book and so if these performers should fall, who would go down with them?changing the face of cookery writing forever.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781859965</amazonuk>1398502227
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Emily PurdyFreya Marske|title=The Boleyn BrideA Marvellous Light
|rating=4
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Elizabeth Howard wants Robin Blyth is nudged into a noble marriage but at 16 she's married off to Thomas Boleynjob in the Civil Service, a jumped up nouveau riche who tries much to hide his humble roots any way chagrin. There he canmeets Edwin Courcey and learns that the streets of London are threaded with magic. It's not Desperate to remove a love match on either side. So curse that threatens to compensate for her husband's shortcomingsswallow him, Elizabeth throws herself into a collection of lovers and Robin follows Edwin to the lives of two of her three children. Yescountryside, she dreams of rosy futures for Mary and George, but for where the third child Anne, born as ugly as a monkey, Elizabeth can't envisage any future so wastes neither dreams nor love on her. However when Henry VII dies hedgegrows bristle with incantations and his second son eventually takes the throne, Elizabeth realises she may not be rightpeople shimmer with power. Having Henry VIII as There they uncover a son-sinister plot that threatens the lives of all magicians in-law may do both Anne and the family a lot of goodBritish Isles.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0349405956</amazonuk>1529080886
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=L C TylerB09F4CTKJR|title=A Cruel Necessity (A John Grey Historical Mystery)Flights for Freedom|author= Steven Burgauer
|rating=4.5
|genre=Historical Fiction
|summary=Once home from her role as a photo-journalist in Afghanistan, Jo decides to move into It's the later stages of World War I and the Brighton flat that her great aunt Elizabeth United States has bequeathed herjust entered the conflict. While searching through Petrol Petronus is a young American who has signed up and joined the belongings that go with 17 Aero Squadron. This company was the homefirst US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada, she finds Elizabeth's WWI diaries from the time that she nursed wounded servicemen from first to be attached to the Indian Corps at RAF and the Brighton Pavilion. These entries cause her first to reflect on her time recording be sent into the more current war and enables her skies to open up to her ex-lover Susie fight the Germans in a series of letters, telling her how it wasactive combat. But before that can happen, Petrol has to master flying the lives of those she met out there, what it did to them and, indeed, to hernotoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846883342</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=LucyChristophe Medler|authortitle=Alan KennedyMadrigal: A Closely Guarded Secret
|rating=4
|genre=General Historical Fiction|summary=Lucy Set against the backdrop of the English Civil War, a secret plan (code-named Madrigal) is a painter. Hiding away discovered by Sir Robert Douse in Dundee on VE Day, she returns from a disaster the summer of an exhibition to a letter from a figure from her past1642. Uncle Albert, still in France, wants to sort out his affairs - who will get what after he's dead. The letter sends Lucy on a voyage of discovery - about As a past full loyal servant of artthe King, lost love, found love, grief, war and about what could possibly come next. Set in pre-war LondonHead of the Secret Service, pre-war and wartime France and windy, rainy Dundee, Lucy it is a love story, but itRobert's also a kind duty to uncover the details of the plan and follow the clues to uncover one of coming-homethe most guarded secrets in history—especially since the plot could affect the King. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0956469663</amazonuk>B095HY8SXQ
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Anne O'Brien1471187179|title=The King's SisterA Beautiful Spy|author=Rachel Hore
|rating=4
|genre=Women's Historical Fiction|summary=ItMinnie is an 's England ordinary' girl living an unexciting life in a leafy provincial suburb. The book is set in 1380 the 1930s and 17 year old Elizabeth of Lancaster has always dreamt of Minnie is expected to live up to her betrothal mother's expectations and find a nice young man to marry, produce children and spend the sort rest of love of which balladeers singher days looking after her husband and their home. So when Unfortunately, this isn't what she wants to do at all and neither does she meets the person her father has lined up, her face drops want to say the leastcontinue working as a secretary. The Earl As a result of Pembroke is eight years old so a chance meeting, she's not pleasedfinds herself drawn into espionage, working for the secret service and effectively living a double life - attempting to infiltrate the Communist Party of Great Britain. However one day love will find Minnie finds herself torn between what she perceives as her duty and cruelly cause her to choose between the love of her life friends she has made - and family with fatal consequenceslikes - whilst working for the Communist Party.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848453469</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=The Lives of Stella BainAfonso Cruz and Rahul Bery (translator)|authortitle=Anita ShreveKokoschka's Doll|rating=42.5|genre=Historical Literary Fiction|summary=The opening of Well, this looked very much like a book I could love from the get-go, which is why I picked my review copy up and flipped pages over several times before actually reading any of it. I found things to potentially delight me each time – a brilliant oneweird section in the middle on darker stock paper, being thrust into a chapter whose number was in the midst of Stella’s confusion 20,000s, letters used as she wakes with no memory in a first aid station near the front line. She knows nothing other than the fact that she can drive an ambulancenarrative form, and the reader knows nothing more than herso on. She soon discovers It intrigued with the subterranean voice a man hears in wartorn Dresden that she can drawwhat little I knew of it mentioned, too, and this is a really nice angle to help learn about her and her past without having to unveil everything all at once. I think But you've seen the use of present tense within star rating that comes with this novel works incredibly well in order to keep the reader at the same speed as the characterreview, and it’s also a writing style I enjoy as a whole because it’s a little bit unusual and brings a different pace to the textcan tell that if love was on these pages, it was not actually caused by them. So what happened?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0349123578</amazonuk>1529402697
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{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=The English GirlChristina Hammonds Reed|authortitle=Margaret LeroyThe Black Kids|rating=4.5|genre=Historical FictionTeens |summary=Stella Whittaker moves from a quiet English town to Vienna in 1937 to improve her music skills. Staying with old family friends, Christina Hammonds Reed's debut novel is set against the Krauses, she feels less comfortable than she expects as a sense backdrop of mysterious menace hangs over the household. Nevertheless1992 Los Angeles riots, Stella enjoys her new life and a reaction to the sophistication absolution of the city. More than anythingfour police officers for beating a black man, she enjoys falling in love with HarriRodney King, a young Jewish doctornearly to death. And despite many warning signsTold from the perspective of Ashley Bennett, Stella’s love for him blinds the novel follows her to the possibility evolution from a silent bystander when confronted with matters of trouble when it seems inevitable race, to othersa woman finding her voice and embracing her heritage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0751551775</amazonuk>1471188191
}}