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[[Category:New Reviews|Historical Fiction]]==Historical fiction==__NOTOC__{{newreview|author=Barry Unsworth|title=The Quality of Mercy|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary='The Quality of Mercy' picks up the story of the author's Booker Prize<!-- Remove --winning 'Sacred Hunger' although if you haven't read the first book, you won't be greatly disadvantaged as the relevant story lines are explained. What you might miss out on is some of the feeling for a few of the main characters, most notably the Irish fiddler, Sullivan who, when this book picks up in spring 1767, has just escaped from prison where the remaining shipmates of the slave ship, the 'Liverpool Merchant' await their trial of piracy. Slavery and abolition thereof remains a central theme of this sequel, but the book draws some poignant similarities with those in bondage due to poverty, and particularly those working in the coal mines of County Durham.>|amazonuk= <amazonuk>0091937124</amazonuk!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=James AitchesonTananarive Due|title=Sworn SwordThe Reformatory|rating=4.5

|summary=The novel Gracetown, Florida. June 1950. After a scuffle with a white boy, twelve year-old Robbie Stephens Jr is set in sentenced to six months at the Gracetown School for Boys, otherwise known as the turbulent years following Reformatory. It's a place with a brutal and dark reputation. But the Battle segregated reformatory is a chamber of Hastingshorrors, haunted by the boys that have died there. We follow the Normans as they set out In order to quell survive the restless school governor and rebellious factions in his Funhouse, Robert must enlist the North help of Englandthe school's ghosts – only they have their own motivations.. An ambush in Durham sees the Normans decimated and determined on revenge - this precipitates the events which follow.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1848093241</amazonuk>1803366532}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lisa SeeKatherine Howe|title=Dreams of JoyA True Account

|genre=Historical General Fiction|summary=It's the late 1950sHannah Masury is living in Boston, and America's teenagers (the very idea a brand new concept) are beginning having been sent to live the all-American dream. For some of them however it isn't all 'Happy Days' diners with a family who run an inn, and rock'n'rollbeing made to work there from a young age. For the second generation Chinese immigrants When she hears there's an alternative: back 'home' there's is to be a brave new world being forged, a world where 'we'd work hanging of some pirates in the fields town, she decides to go and sing songswatch. We'd do exercises Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in the park. Wea young boy'd help clean s death at the neighbourhood and share mealshands of two vicious pirates. We wouldnShe hides away, so that they don't be poor find and kill her too, and we wouldn't be rich. We'd all be equal.' |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408822296</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Buchan|title=Greenmantle|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=I'm told that Buchan is still widely read. Really? "John Buchan? Oh yesthen to escape them completely she runs away to sea, he wrote The Thirty-Nine Steps"… dressing as a boy and thatjoining the notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as far as most of us geta cabin boy. Let's be honest most She soon finds herself in the thick of us only know that one things when there is a mutiny on board, and from the many film versions, just about all there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of which take huge liberties with life on the original plotocean waves.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846971977</amazonuk>0861547438

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ellen FeldmanSarah Marsh|title=Next to LoveA Sign of Her Own

|genre=Historical General Fiction|summary=BabeAfter a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Grace and Millie are three American girls who have grown up togetherEllen Lark loses her hearing. Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, everything about her life changes. Now young women each marry their sweetheart just as America becomes involved Living in a time when the Second World Waruse of sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a school where she is taught to lip read, but physically restrained from signing. But on a fateful day From here, she ends up in 1944, sixteen telegrams arrive from another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the War Department bringing death to the locals, including Grace deaf and Millie whose husbands have both been killedusing a system called Visible Speech. Babe seems to be At the lucky one as her husbandsame time, ClaudeBell is working on other inventions and ideas, returns from the War, but and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in truth he will never be the same man againa complicated tangle of espionage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0330544500</amazonuk>1035401614

 {{newreview|author=Fiona Mountain|title=Isabella|rating=4|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=The fate of mutineer, Fletcher Christian in the 18th century remains a mystery even today but Fiona Mountain has pieced together a dramatic and powerful story based on rumours and clues that Fletcher returned to England to be with his long-lost love, Isabella Curwen. Fletcher, the son of a bankrupt family and Isabella, the sole heiress of a huge fortune are prevented from marrying. Their relationship is manipulated by those around them and a young, naïve Isabella is forced to marry her cousin, John. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099562251</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ben KaneClaire North|title=Hannibal: Enemy House of RomeOdysseus

|genre=Historical Literary Fiction|summary=Thanks to his [[The Forgotten Legion by Ben Kane|Forgotten Legion]] trilogy, Ben Kane has recently bought Roman times to life in me far ''What could matter more than history and Latin lessons at school ever did. Having enjoyed this first trilogy, I've been eagerly awaiting his ''Hannibal'' trilogy, since he told Bookbag about it when we interviewed him. Finally, the wait is over and ''Hannibal: Enemy of Romelove?'' is here.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184809227X</amazonuk>}}

{{newreview|author=Jose Saramago and Margaret Jull Costa|title=The Elephantfollow-up to the excellent ''Ithaca''s Journey|rating=3picks up a few months after where we left off.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=This novel is inspired by a real event – In the marriage gift palace of an elephant from Dom João III of Portugal Odysseus, with delicate care Queen Penelope continues to his cousin Maximilianrule 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 Hapsburg Archduke throne of Austriathe Western Isles. When Having survived – politically and physical – the gift was acceptedchaotic storm that Clytemnestra brought to Ithaca's shores, Queen Penelope is on the elephant Solomonbrink of a fragile peace. One that shatters however with the return of Orestes, his mahout Subhro and numerous soldiersKing of Mycenae, oxen and portershis sister Elektra, walked from Lisbon to Vienna to deliver the present, arriving in 1552. This is the story of that journeyseeking refuge.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099546884</amazonuk>0356516075

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sara StockbridgeB0C7J9D21B|title=Cross My Palm|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=Fortune teller Rose Lee lives on the edge of London society A Captive in 1860, making her living by entertaining Algiers (and sometimes deceivingMuhammed Amalfi Mysteries) the rich by reading their palms. She fears the fate she has read for herself in her own palm which is perhaps what makes her cautious of delivering the whole truth to the ladies that employ her. On one particular night Rose is called to the house of Lady Quayle, a woman of high society, who delights in having her fortune read, taking everything Rose tells her as gospel. One of the guests present is Emily, a young girl and friend of Lady Quayle's daughter Tabitha.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>070118504X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Alison Weir|title=The Captive Queen|rating=3|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=Vaclav and Lena are both children of Russian immigrants, growing up in Brooklyn. Vaclav dreams of becoming a fantastic magician, with his friend Lena as his assistant, and as children they practise their routine together, making lists of the things they'll need, the costumes they will wear and the tricks they will perform. Vaclav is confident and happy, but Lena is quiet, withdrawn and struggles with speaking English. Yet Vaclav believes, always, that they are destined to be together. Even when Lena disappears one day and is gone from his life for many years still he hopes that, somehow, he will find her again.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0434020443</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Helen Humphreys|title=The Reinvention of LoveA J Lewis|rating=4.5

|summary='When we first meet our hero, his name is Ettore and he lives at The Reinvention House of LoveBeautiful Swallows. Idyllic as this might sound, it' is one of those stories that is so bizarre s a bordello and strange that it could only be based on factual eventsEttore's mother died when he was born. Essentially it is a good He's not been short of mothers, oldthough -fashioned love triangle set mostly but for someone of his background in Paris in the period from the 1830s late-eighteenth-century Amalfi, it's difficult to the 1860s; a world where fighting duels is a commonplace eventobtain decent employment. The triangle features stint working with the great French literary writer Victor Hugo, his wife Adèle preparation of anchovies didn't work out and bastards are considered bad luck on fishing boats. Ettore was nothing if not resourceful - and the altogether strange critic Charles Saintdetermined -Beuve who narrates much of this story, with brief breaks for Adèle's side of events and some letters written by the Hugo's youngest daughter, also called Adèle (but let's call her, it was not long before he had a successful business as she a guide for visitors. He was known to her family, Dédé to avoid confusion)even saving some money.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687985</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Karen HarperEssie Fox|title=The Queen's GovernessFascination

|summary=Kat Ashley isn't The Victorian era is incredibly over-romanticised as a name one usually associates with the Tudor erasetting for historical fiction (matched only, perhaps, but just like by the Second World War) which has often led to more famous characters than a few writers mishandling it. There's such a glut of media set in the period, she has her own fascinating story era that the hallmarks we've come to associate with it are familiar to tellthe point of being cliched, a story which hackneyed even. All this book captures perfectlyis simply to illustrate that it would be an easy thing to do poorly. As Thomas Cromwell's spyBut despite that, Anne Boleyn's confidante something about it still grabs me – and later Princess Elizabethsomething about this book's governess, Kat Ashley certainly knew the Tudor court description did as well and it is through her fictional diary entries that the reader is invited to know the dazzling, yet dangerous Tudor court too.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0091940419</amazonuk>1914585526

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Roy Jacobsen, Don Bartlett (translator) and Don Shaw (translator)Nicole Jarvis|title=Child Wonder|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=1961 was a year of change, a time, as Jacobsen puts it, ''when men became boys and housewives women''. At the outset Finn and his mother are leading a quiet, rather timorous life A Portrait in a working class Oslo suburb. Then change overwhelms them, not through world events, but in the form of a mysterious child who is Finn's half sister. Linda is not like other children and Finn's attempt to deal with her impact on his family is the central thread in this quintessential story of growing up.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857050184</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Amor Towles|title=Rules of CivilityShadow

|summary=Katey Kontent works hard during the day as a typist at a big law firm in 1930s Manhattan, but at night she likes ''I want all of Florence to sample the nightlife – jazz clubs in Greenwich Village. There on New Yearknow my name''s Eve 1937, she and her roommate Eve meet the charming Tinker Grey. This is the start of a year of many changes for Katey and her friends.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444708848</amazonuk>}}

{{newreview|author=Meira Chand|title=A Different Sky|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=We meet the first of the three main characters - Chinese Mei Lan on Cast out from Rome, Artemisia Gentileschi arrives in Florence seeking an oasis in which her art can find a trip with home and where her devoted minder-nursemaid into townfuture can thrive rather than stagnate. The sights and smells intrigue the young girl But as some as they are a far cry she enters Florentine society she faces great opposition from her comfortable home the powerful Accademia, the self-proclaimed guardians of the healing magics that through paintings have the power to protect the city and its surroundingscitizens from plagues and curses. Rather than appreciating The all that space -male Accademia has hoarded power over art and architecture for centuries and the beautiful objects in the family homeguard it above all else. To them, Mei Lan feels lonely (she's Artemisia – an only child) ambitious young woman who promises trouble and even hemmed in. But perhaps she'll change as she grows up– has no place amongst them and their society.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099546248</amazonuk>1803362340

{{newreview|author=Lian Hearn|title=Blossoms and Shadows|rating=3.5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=I see from Set in the front cover that Hearn is already near-distant future, in a best-selling author with her ''Tales Of world on the Otori'' so I was looking forward to a good readverge of climate collapse, Britain is in great peril. However, I did slump The British Isles desperately needs a little when I opened hero (or several) to save the book day and rescue what little remains. What no-one expected was presented with several pages that one of the Knights of the story's characters - sub-divided into fictional and historicalRound Table would answer the call.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857382977</amazonuk>0356518523

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=D J TaylorG K Holloway|title=Derby DayIn the Shadows of Castles

|summary=I read (We begin after the momentous battle in 1066 and reviewed) Tayloron the day of William of Normandy's [[Ask Alice by D J Taylor|Ask Alice]] and took to Taylor's style straight away. Is this one going to be coronation as good - or even better? Time to find out ..King of England. To set the tone we first meet a couple of no-gooders as they plot and scheme and itWilliam's all about horses position is not secure and the Derbynew king has many challenges. Imposing authority through a coronation is important. And by degrees, Taylor introduces his main characters, chapter by chapter, William is right to his readersworry. As this novel runs to over 400 pages, there's plenty of time for flesh to be heaped upon While the bones of many of these characters. Soprevious king, for exampleHarold, we have a rather cold is dead and calculating daughter living with her elderly father who appear right at the start likelihood of more pitched battles is over, the novel. I got rebels are stirring and much of the sense that things were about country does not wish to happen - and they certainly did. There's recognise a strong sense of emotions just bubbling under the surface with this duonew overlord.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0701183586</amazonuk>1800422466

{{newreview|author=Suzannah Dunn|title=The Confession of Katherine Howard|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=Katherine Howard was Henry VIII's fifth wifeMaya is a young girl living in a hunter gatherer village during the Mesolithic era. She was perhaps Climate change is occurring, the most seductive Sea of his wives Grass encroaches further and a considerable contrast to her predecessor, Anna of Cleves. Shefurther into Maya's been consigned to history as a silly girlforest home, but careful reading gives the lie to thisand food is becoming more and more scarce. Suzannah Dunn begins her story when Katherine was twelve years old and went What to live do? Can the law givers in her step-grandmother's household. There she met Cathryn – generally known as Cat – Tilney, but the two girls were very different and didn't hit it off initially. Cat was quietly ambitiousfederation of villages muster peaceful ways to cope? Can the Traveller, aware that she needed to make a good marriagespiritual figure who interprets the wisdom of All Life, whilst Katherine was image-conscious and very interested in the boys.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007258305</amazonuk>provide solutions?

 {{newreview|title=Wall of Days|author=Alastair Bruce|rating=3.5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=The front cover of this debut novel caught my full and undivided attention with ''Alone, ten years on an island, until one day...'' I couldn't wait to start reading. We meet the central character - we don't know his name just yet and in the grand scheme of things it doesn't really matter. He's living alone on an island, somewhere in the world. Is it the past, the present or even the future? As the story developed I decided on the former.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846688000</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Rory Clements1529125898|title=John Shakespeare: Prince|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=This is the third in the excellent Elizabethan murder mystery series, featuring John Shakespeare, brother of Will. An inexplicable murder is linked to a much deeper plot of political dimensions, leading Shakespeare into danger and tragedy. A series of bombings, which appear to be targeting the immigrant population causes huge unrest and fear, and leads to the uncovering of further political dimensions.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848544251</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewGodmersham Park|author=Felix J Palma|title=The Map of TimeGill Hornby

|summary=Like a lot of readers I cannot resist a book with an immediate hook that draws you into the story quickly and in a seemingly effortless fashion. From the very first page of 'The Map of Time' Felix Palma had me firmly in his grasp and continued to hold me there If it were not for the entirety casual dereliction of the novel. Not once did I become bored or distracted as I relished every wordodd gentleman's duty, page and chapter of this remarkable bookthere would no women to teach well-bred daughters at all. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007344120</amazonuk>}}''

{{newreview|author=Margaret James|title=The Golden Chain|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=It's 1931 and teenager Daisy Denham, along with her parents Alex and Rose, and two brothers have left their life in India and moved Anne Sharpe was thirty-one years old when she arrived at Godmersham Park to take up the position of governess to Melbury House in Dorset, twelve-year-old Fanny Austen. She had no experience of teaching but this was a place full case of history for Alex and Rosenecessity. Daisy is not keen on Until the death of her new mother, Anne had a comfortable life and surroundings and is desperate to escape, particularly when she discovers a long held family secret that casts a shadow across was loved by both parents although her pastfather was frequently absent from the household. She soon meets handsome Ewan Fraser, a young man forced to spend his holidays in Dorset thanks to his overbearing When her motherdied, her father cast her off and the two strike up an instant friendship that soon turns would have nothing more to love, spurred on by their joint interest in working on the stagedo with her. Ewan soon gives Daisy No explanation was offered but she would receive an annuity of £35 a golden chain and Daisy promises never to take it offyear. Her maid, Agnes, would receive nothing but was fortunately taken in by some neighbours.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190693164X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Adrienne McDonnellMelissa Fu |title=The Doctor and the DivaPeach Blossom Spring |rating=43.5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=We first meet one of I loved the central charactersprelude to Peach Blossom Spring, a short chapter entitled ''Origins''. Unfortunately it is the successful, young obstetrician Dr Ravell as he mingles with the great and the good Bostonians at only truly poetic part of a high-level social gatheringbook that I expected more from. His reputation seems Covering Chinese history from 1938 to precede him 2005 as viewed through one guest enthuses family'After nineteen years in a barren marriage s perspective... thanks to youWhen their home city is set ablaze during the war with Japan, they had twins.' High praise indeed. And at this gathering he not only meets a future patient, Erika von Kessler, but he is also enraptured by young mother (Meilin) and her singing voicefour-year-old son (Renshu) are among those who flee. He tries The story follows them on their journey across China, and in Renshu's case eventually to explain all this but finds it difficult so ends up by saying 'It was not an earthly voice; it was a shimmeringAmerica.' I loved that line.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0751543608</amazonuk>1472277538

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Amitav Ghosh1916072038|title=River of SmokeThe House in the Hollow (The Talbot Saga)|author=Allie Cresswell|rating=4.5

|summary=At over 500 pages, this is a big book and it's also a big book in terms We meet part of the subject matters that it covers; the whole colonial situation regarding parts of the East as well as the properties and problems of the poppy's product - opiumTalbot family in Yorkshire in November 1811. Ghosh also crams Twenty-seven-year-old Jocelyn Talbot and her mother have travelled in a wealth of very different and diverse characters so that the novel has the feel of an exotic and some discomfort from their home at timesEcklington, enchanting pot-pourri of a read. I have to say at the outset that I find authors such as Rushdie wordy, very wordyhouse in the hollow. I have GhoshThe two women are angry with each other and Jocelyn is well aware of her mother's ''The Glass Palace'' in my ever-growing 'to read' pile. I wonder if the latter will be as wordy as the former. Time to find out...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0719568986</amazonuk>}}strengths and weaknesses:

{{newreview|author=Anna Lawrence Pietroni|title=Ruby's Spoon|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=“This 'She is the tale practiced at subterfuge, at concealing, beneath a facade of three women – one witchrespectability, one mermaid and one missing – and how Ruby was caught up in between”the deplorable truth''.

Despite the opening, this novel Hester is more gritty realism than fantasy – there is lots of mythical imagery but in truthfurious about Jocelyn's refusal to do as she was asked, the setting for which has precipitated ''this novel is a small industrial town cut off from everywhere else by the surrounding canals. It is 1933 (the middle of the Great Depression), violent and a stranger arrives in town to turn Ruby’s life upside down, for better or worseunexpected removal''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099540053</amazonuk>}}

{{newreview|author=Richard Hughes|title=The Fox in the Attic|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=The novel opens with a scene set to grab the reader's attention: a young girl has been found dead somewhere on Then we are told of the Welsh coast. And straight away I'm aware birth of Hughes' particular writing style. Fluid with proper sentences. It all has a traditional feel which I liked. Then we cut fairly briskly to the young Augustine who's rattling around in some pile. Due to the fallen in the First World Warchild and, soon after, many heirs did not return to England to take their rightful (I'm getting into the languageHester Talbot departs, you'll notice) place leaving Jocelyn in the family dynastyshame and isolation in Yorkshire.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848879784</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Geraldine BrooksAnnabel Abbs|title=Caleb's CrossingThe Language of Food|rating=4.5

|summary=Let's start, as Geraldine Brooks Eliza Acton is a poet who has, never had the slightest inclination to boil an egg. When tasked with writing a fact: in 1665 the first Native Americancookery book, Caleb Cheeshateaumaukshe recruits Ann Kirby, graduated from Harvard Collegea local woman with a troubled home life. Around thisTogether, Brooks has created a wholly fictional story (the known facts are so few that this is largely unavoidable). The stroke of genius here is to put the story into the words of the entirely fictitious Bethia Mayfieldthey test, craft, refine and reshape the daughter world of an English minister on what we now call Martha's Vinyarddomestic cookery, where Caleb lived in reinventing the Wampanoag tribe. At various points in her life, Bethia sets down events concerning her early secret friendship with Caleb on the island, to accompanying him and her brother to Harvard recipe book and changing the subsequent eventsface of cookery writing forever.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0007333536</amazonuk>1398502227

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Claire Holden RothmanFreya Marske|title=The Heart SpecialistA Marvellous Light

|summary=We first meet teenager Agnes at home - dissecting Robin Blyth is nudged into a recently-dead squirrel job in secret. She knows full well that her family would not approve of this unseemly behaviourthe Civil Service, especially from a girl. She's expected much to be a young lady and enjoying ladylike hobbies, like playing with dollshis chagrin. Fat chance. Feisty Agnes is her father's daughter There he meets Edwin Courcey and she has an interest in medicine. It must be in the blood, in the genes. If learns that's the case it's skipped younger sister Laure. The two sisters streets of London are very differentthreaded with magic. Laure is Desperate to remove a gentle and pretty girl but her health is rather delicate. Agnes is a bit of a tom-boy and a go-getter. Their grandmother despairs of young Agnes - what's curse that threatens to become of her? The norm is marriage and a familyswallow him, this medical nonsense must be stamped out. It's out of the question. This profession is strictly for the men. Try telling that Robin follows Edwin to Agnes.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1851687947</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Anne O'Brien|title=Devil's Consort|rating=5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=In the year 1137 fifteen year old Eleanor of Aquitaine is an orphan. Just before her father's death he asked King Louis VI of France to take care of hercountryside, where the hedgegrows bristle with incantations and the unscrupulous Louis took advantage of this request to marry her to his pious son Louis VIIpeople shimmer with power. When her new father in law passes away, There they uncover a sinister plot that threatens the young woman becomes Queen lives of France and is determined to safeguard her precious lands from all who want to take them – even if it leads to conflict with her weak-willed husbandmagicians in the British Isles. Then she meets the Count of Anjou, Geoffrey Plantagenet, and his son Henry…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0778304272</amazonuk>1529080886

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Elizabeth SpellerB09F4CTKJR|title=The Strange Fate of Kitty EastonFlights for Freedom|author= Steven Burgauer

|summary=I reviewed and thoroughly enjoyed SpellerIt's [[The Return the later stages of Captain John Emmett by Elizabeth Speller|The Return Of Captain John Emmett]] so World War I and the United States has just entered the conflict. Petrol Petronus is a young American who has signed up and joined the 17 Aero Squadron. This company was really keen the first US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada, the first to get stuck be attached to the RAF and the first to be sent into the follow-up. The main character, officer Laurence Bartram is also an important character in skies to fight the previous book, but both are stand-alone novels Germans in their own right. The front cover is evocative and is also as pretty as a picture - literallyactive combat. With its intriguing title which had me asking all sorts of questions But before I'd even opened that can happen, Petrol has to master flying the book, it was a good startnotoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1844086313</amazonuk>

 {{newreview|author=Carol Birch|title=Jamrach's Menagerie|rating=4.5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=The novel is written in the first person by a young boy called Jaffy. He describes the poverty of his life at home which includes the delightful line 'We lived in the crow's nest of Mrs Reagan's house.' He also describes his struggling mother and his absent father. But I got the sense that here was a bright and resilient boy. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847676561</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Karen Maitland|title=The Gallow's Curse|rating=5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=This is the eagerly anticipated, and long awaited third novel by the immensely talented author Karen Maitland. It seems as if her ever expanding and permanently loyal fan base will not be disappointed in any way by her latest offering. It's rare (if ever), that I would be moved to give a 5 star rating to any novel - but this one richly deserves the highest of accolades.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0718156358</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Stuart ClarkChristophe Medler|title=The Sky's Dark LabyrinthMadrigal: A Closely Guarded Secret

|summary=This book is heavily based on fact. All of Set against the characters are real people - apart from one. Some backdrop of us may be familiar with the names of Galileo Galilei and Johannes Kepler English Civil War, a secret plan (due to code-named Madrigal) is discovered by Sir Robert Douse in the importance summer of their respective work, both men are afforded healthy chunks in my Oxford English Dictionary)1642. Clark also has As a rather impressive working CV including holding a Fellowship loyal servant of the Royal Astronomical Society. But what I personally really liked King, and appreciated was Head of the line on the bookSecret Service, it is Robert's front cover which said 'Knowledge can be a dangerous thing.'|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846971748</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=M C Beaton|title=The Travelling Matchmaker: Emily Goes to Exeter|rating=3|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=Emily Goes duty to Exeter is by way of 'Being uncover the First Volume details of the Travelling Matchmaker' as plan and follow the subheading has it on the frontispiece: the beginning of a new series obviously.  If like me you have come clues to Beaton by way uncover one of Hamish Macbeth this might seem like something of a diversion. A little research shows you that the most guarded secrets in fact Marion Chesney, who writes under a number of pseudonyms (including Beaton) has a prolific work-rate. Having produced upwards of 130 books history—especially since starting writing full time in the 1980s, focussing on crime and historical romance, there can be few avenues down which she has yet to wanderplot could affect the King.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1849014795</amazonuk>B095HY8SXQ

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Margaret Dickinson1471187179|title=Forgive and Forget|rating=3.5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=Straight away I got the sense of this book because of its language and style. Lots of adjectives such as Polly has a ' ... fiery personality' and 'Cold fear ran through the girl's slim body.' This book is very easy to read, to get into as the tone is conversational. There are lines like 'The young girl's eyes widened and her mouth dropped open in a horrified gasp. She clutched her throat as she uttered hoarsely, 'no, oh, no!' ' This book will appeal to those readers who like a rather uncomplicated yarn but also with a good dash of romance. True escapism. Personally, the title is too slushy for me but I appreciate that it fits in nicely with the genre and also with Dickinson's style. But, I have to say, there's an awful lot of 'hearts thumping' and 'eyes blazing' - too many for me, I'm afraid.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>033051623X</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewA Beautiful Spy|author=Sylvia Broady|title=The Yearning Heart|rating=3|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=It is 1941 so when an unmarried Frances Bewholme becomes pregnant she is shunned by her family and sent to an isolated farm to live and work. To add to her shame and disgrace Fran's unborn baby is not just any man's; it is her brother-in-law's. Victor Renton, home on leave from the war takes advantage of Fran one night when she comes home, upset and heartbroken.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709092113</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Maaza Mengiste|title=Beneath the Lion's GazeRachel Hore

|summary=Ethiopia 1974Minnie is an 'ordinary' girl living an unexciting life in a leafy provincial suburb. Emperor Haile Selassie The book is an old set in the 1930s and Minnie is expected to live up to her mother's expectations and find a nice young man barely clinging on to powermarry, produce children and spend the rest of her days looking after her husband and their home. Unfortunately, this isn't what she wants to do at all and neither does she want to continue working as a secretary. Still thought As a result ofa chance meeting, even by those rebelling against himshe finds herself drawn into espionage, as working for the secret service and effectively living a demidouble life -god that they daren't disrespect let alone challenge he has held the country in thrall attempting to his aristocratic government supported by infiltrate the violence Communist Party of Great Britain. Minnie finds herself torn between what she perceives as her duty and repression of the army friends she has made - and likes - whilst working for the policeCommunist Party.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099539926</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Alma KatsuAfonso Cruz and Rahul Bery (translator)|title=The TakerKokoschka's Doll|rating=2.5|genre=General Literary Fiction|summary=When Dr Luke Findley begins his nightshift at Aroostook County Hospital in St AndrewsWell, Mainethis looked very much like a book I could love from the get-go, things are quiet until Lanny McIlvrae which is brought in by the policewhy I picked my review copy up and flipped pages over several times before actually reading any of it. Lanny is covered I found things to potentially delight me each time – a weird section in blood and claims she has killed the middle on darker stock paper, a man and left him chapter whose number was in the woods. Desperate to escape20, Lanny quickly asks for Luke's help000s, but he is not sure at firstletters used as narrative form, and so Lanny decides to tell Luke her life story, on. It intrigued with the subterranean voice a story man hears in wartorn Dresden that begins in the early Puritan settlement what little I knew of St Andrews in 1809 and spans nearly two hundred yearsit mentioned, taking Lanny from her home to Boston and beyondtoo. A story But you've seen the star rating that is richcomes with this review, imaginative and entirely authenticcan tell that if love was on these pages, filling the majority of the novel, and there wasn't a moment when I questioned her reliability as she tells Luke everything, chapter it was not actually caused by chapter, as he helps her to escape, slowly drawing him and the reader into her worldthem. So what happened?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846058171</amazonuk>1529402697

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Glenn TaylorChristina Hammonds Reed|title=The Marrowbone Marble CompanyBlack Kids

|genre=Historical FictionTeens |summary=Glenn Taylor tells a big story with a deft lightness of touch. Covering the period from the early 1940s to the late 1960s, The Marrowbone Marble Company (and itChristina Hammonds Reed's marble in debut novel is set against the form backdrop of the glass marble game for children rather than the stone variety) tells 1992 Los Angeles riots, a reaction to the story absolution of Loyal Ledford, four police officers for beating a hard working black man in West Virginia who marries , Rodney King, nearly to death. Told from the daughter perspective of Ashley Bennett, the glass factory where he works. Returning novel follows her evolution from a traumatic World War twosilent bystander when confronted with matters of race, he decides to start his own business manufacturing marbles. If that sounds dull, it's far from ita woman finding her voice and embracing her heritage.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0007359071</amazonuk>1471188191

{{newreview|author=Ellen Bryson|title=The Transformation of Bartholomew Fortuno: A Love Story|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction |summary=Set in the days and months following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, The Transformation of Bartholomew Fortuno is an inventive and highly entertaining story of the life of the ''curiosities'' performing in the great PT Barnum's great American Museum.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330533819</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jean Teule|title=Monsieur Montespan|rating=3.5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=The Marquis de Montespan is totally in love with his new wife Athénaïs and she with him, so much so that when she becomes a lady in waiting at the palace of Versailles, she begs her husband to remove her in case she falls for the charms of the famous Sun King. The Marquis refuses because of the prestige and fortune her position brings them – but it's a decision he quickly regrets, as Louis XIVindeed manages to cuckold him. With all of France talking about the new woman in the king's life, Montespan is expected to take the rewards offered to him in exchange for his wife and leave the couple alone. But many years before the French Revolution, instead he takes the unprecedented step of standing up to the king, ignoring his offers and proclaiming his cuckoldry by adding horns to his coat of arms. Can the man who's become a figure of fun throughout the country win back his wife?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906040303</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Paul R Spiring and Hugh Cooke|title=Wheels of Anarchy by Max Pemberton|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=This mystery-adventure book was written and published around 100 years ago. Will it stand the test of time? The back cover blurb says confidently that this '' adventure story ... makes James Bond look like a stay at home ...'' Before you get into the story proper there's quite a lot of information in the introductory pages. Some of it I did find interesting (the page about Max Pemberton and Sherlock Holmes for instance) but some readers may feel a little bogged down before they've even started to read chapter one. Both Pemberton and Holmes belonged to a small, elite criminology society in London. I got the impression that the two co-compilers felt as if they had to justify themselves somehow. I ploughed Move on ...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907685316</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Christina Courtenay|title=The Scarlet Kimono|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=It's 1611 and young Hannah's life in Plymouth is anything but exciting. She has a horrid elder sister to deal with, and is jealous of her brother Jacob's career aboard a merchant ship. Realising the life her parents have mapped out for her as wife to a man she loathes is not for her, Hannah decides to take action and control of her own destiny. Soon she runs away from home, disguising herself as a boy and stowing away on one of the ships under her brother's command. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906931291</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Sara Sheridan|title=Secret of the Sands|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=It's the summer of the year 1883. William Wilberforce, hero of the anti-slavery movement is enjoying a gentleman's life in London. But, far away in Abyssinia, things are far from rosy for the local people. The situation facing them is ugly and very dangerous - slavers (what a horrible word) are in the area and with the stark sentence 'It takes only seven minutes to capture almost everyone' we get the picture, loud and clear. Sheridan wastes no time in giving her readers the heart-wrenching details: the elderly are separated and treated with very little dignity (they're almost worthless, not worth the bother of transportation), the fit and healthy are singled out and lastly, the young are segregated. They are 'prized' most of all. And into this latter category falls a pretty 17 year old girl called Zena. She is spirited. She will not show any fear. She thinks for a split second of running but is intelligent enough to know that she'd be beaten severely for her sheer insubordination and probably even killed on the spot. But behind her expressive eyes she is thinking and plotting ...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847561993</amazonuk>}}[[Newest History Reviews]]