Whether your passion is The Ancient Greeks, The Wars of The Roses or The Russian Revolution, you'll find stories of life during these eras and every other, often using factual accounts to build a fictional narrative.
Historical Fiction Books
Penguin Putnam Inc The Bastard of Istanbul
Book SynopsisA “vivid and entertaining” (Chicago Tribune) tale about the tangled history of two families, from the author of The Island of Missing Trees (a Reese''s Book Club Pick) Zesty, imaginative . . . a Turkish version of Amy Tan''s The Joy Luck Club. —USA Today As an Armenian American living in San Francisco, Armanoush feels like part of her identity is missing and that she must make a journey back to the past, to Turkey, in order to start living her life. Asya is a nineteen-year-old woman living in an extended all-female household in Istanbul who loves Jonny Cash and the French existentialists. The Bastard of Istanbul tells the story of their two families--and a secret connection linking them to a violent event in the history of their homeland. Filed with humor and understanding, this exuberant, dramatic novel is about memory and forgetting, about the need to examine the past and the desire to erase it, and about Turkey itself.
£15.20
Penguin Publishing Group Luncheon of the Boating Party
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£16.15
Penguin Publishing Group Wolf Totem
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£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc The Secret Scripture
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£14.40
Penguin Putnam Inc Justine
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£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc The Personal History of Rachel DuPree
Book SynopsisSoon to be a Major Motion Picture Starring Emmy Award Winner and Oscar Nominee Viola Davis; An eye-opening look at the little-explored area of a black frontier woman in the American West. --Chicago Sun-Times Praised by Alice Walker and many other bestselling writers, The Personal History of Rachel DuPree is an award-winning debut novel with incredible heart about life on the prairie as it's rarely been seen. Reminiscent of The Color Purple, as well as the frontier novels of Laura Ingalls Wilder and Willa Cather, it opens a window on the little-known history of African American homesteaders and gives voice to an extraordinary heroine who embodies the spirit that built America.
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc Elizabeth I The Novel
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£18.00
Penguin Putnam Inc Calebs Crossing
Book SynopsisA bestselling tale of passion and belief, magic and adventure from the author of The Secret Chord and of March, winner of the Pulitzer Prize.Bethia Mayfield is a restless and curious young woman growing up in Martha's vineyard in the 1660s amid a small band of pioneering English Puritans. At age twelve, she meets Caleb, the young son of a chieftain, and the two forge a secret bond that draws each into the alien world of the other. Bethia's father is a Calvinist minister who seeks to convert the native Wampanoag, and Caleb becomes a prize in the contest between old ways and new, eventually becoming the first Native American graduate of Harvard College. Inspired by a true story and narrated by the irresistible Bethia, Caleb’s Crossing brilliantly captures the triumphs and turmoil of two brave, openhearted spirits who risk everything in a search for knowledge at a time of superstition and ignorance.
£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc Changos Beads and TwoTone Shoes A Novel
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£13.60
Penguin Putnam Inc NW
Book SynopsisA 2012 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist • One of The New York Times Book Review's 10 Best Books of 2012 • One of TIME's Top 10 Fiction Books of 2012 • One of The Wall Street Journal's Best 10 Fiction Books of 2012 • A New York Times and Washington Post Notable Book of 2012“[NW] is that rare thing, a book that is radical and passionate and real.” —Anne Enright, The New York Times Book Review“A triumph . . . As Smith threads together her characters' inner and outer worlds, every sentence sings.” —The Guardian“A powerful portrait of class and identity in multicultural London.” —Entertainment WeeklySet in northwest London, Zadie Smith’s brilliant tragicomic novel follows fo
£15.30
Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd An Artist In The Floating World
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£20.00
Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd The Secret Life Of Bees
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£37.49
Penguin Putnam Inc Dreaming for Freud
Book SynopsisAn award-winning author reimagines one of Freud’s most famous and controversial cases. Sheila Kohler's memoir Once We Were Sisters is now available.Acclaimed for her spare prose and exceptional psychological insights in her novels Becoming Jane Eyre and Love Child, Sheila Kohler’s latest is inspired by Sigmund Freud’s Dora: An Analysis of a Case of Hysteria. Dreaming for Freud paints a provocative and sensual portrait of one of history’s most famous patients.In the fall of 1900, Dora’s father forces her to begin treatment with the doctor. Visiting him daily, the seventeen-year-old girl lies on his ottoman and tells him frankly about her strange life, and above all about her father's desires as far as she is concerned. But Dora abruptly ends her treatment after only eleven weeks, just as Freud was convinced he was on the cusp of a major discovery. In Dreaming for Freud<
£13.60
Penguin Putnam Inc The Girl You Left Behind
Book SynopsisFrom the New York Times bestselling author of The Giver of Stars and the forthcoming Someone Else's Shoes, a sweeping bestseller of love and loss, deftly weaving two journeys from World War I France to present day London. Paris, World War I. Sophie Lefèvre must keep her family safe while her adored husband, Édouard, fights at the front. When their town falls to the Germans, Sophie is forced to serve them every evening at her hotel. From the moment the new Kommandant sets eyes on Sophie’s portrait—painted by her artist husband—a dangerous obsession is born. Almost a century later in London, Sophie’s portrait hangs in the home of Liv Halston, a wedding gift from her young husband before his sudden death. After a chance encounter reveals the portrait’s true worth, a battle begins over its troubled history and Liv’s world is turned upside all over again.
£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc The Signature of All Things A Novel
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£9.45
Penguin Putnam Inc The Ship of Brides
Book SynopsisFrom the New York Times bestselling author of The Giver of Stars and Someone Else's Shoes, a post-WWII story of the war brides who crossed the seas by the thousands to face their unknown futures. 1946. World War II has ended and all over the world, young women are beginning to fulfill the promises made to the men they wed in wartime. In Sydney, Australia, four women join 650 other war brides on an extraordinary voyage to England—aboard HMS Victoria, which still carries not just arms and aircraft but a thousand naval officers. Rules are strictly enforced, from the aircraft carrier’s captain down to the lowliest young deckhand. But the men and the brides will find their lives intertwined despite the Navy’s ironclad sanctions. And for Frances Mackenzie, the complicated young woman whose past comes back to haunt her far from home, the journey will change her life in ways she never could have predicted—forever.
£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc Thomas Jefferson Dreams of Sally Hemings
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£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc Passing
Book SynopsisA NETFLIX BOOK CLUB PICKThe powerful, thrilling, and tragic tale about the fluidity of racial identity that continues to resonate today, with an introduction by Emily Bernard. Now a major motion picture starring Tessa Thompson and Alexander SkarsgårdA Penguin Vitae EditionClare Kendry is living on the edge. Light-skinned, elegant, and ambitious, she is married to a racist white man unaware of her African American heritage, and has severed all ties to her past after deciding to pass as a white woman. Clare''s childhood friend, Irene Redfield, just as light-skinned, has chosen to remain within the African American community, and is simultaneously allured and repelled by Clare''s risky decision to engage in racial masquerade for personal and societal gain. After frequenting African American-centric gatherings together in Harlem, Clare''s interest in Irene turns into a homoerotic longing for Irene''s black identity that she abandoned and can never embrace again, and she is forced to grapple with her decision to pass for white in a way that is both tragic and telling.Penguin Classics launches a new hardcover series with five American classics that are relevant and timeless in their power, and part of a dynamic and diverse landscape of classic fiction and nonfiction from almost seventy-five years of classics publishing. Penguin Vitae provides readers with beautifully designed classics that have shaped the course of their lives, and welcomes new readers to discover these literary gifts of personal inspiration, intellectual engagement, and creative originality.
£18.00
Penguin Putnam Inc The Joy Luck Club
Book Synopsis“The Joy Luck Club is one of my favorite books. From the moment I first started reading it, I knew it was going to be incredible. For me, it was one of those once-in-a-lifetime reading experiences that you cherish forever. It inspired me as a writer and still remains hugely inspirational.” —Kevin Kwan, author of Crazy Rich AsiansPart of the Penguin Orange Collection, a limited-run series of twelve influential and beloved American classics in a bold series design offering a modern take on the iconic Penguin paperbackWinner of the 2016 AIGA + Design Observer 50 Books 50 Covers competition For the seventieth anniversary of Penguin Classics, the Penguin Orange Collection celebrates the heritage of Penguin’s iconic book design with twelve influential American literary classics representing the breadth and diversity of the Penguin Classics library. These collectible editions are dressed in the
£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc The African Trilogy Things Fall Apart Arrow of
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£20.00
Penguin Putnam Inc Eye of the Needle
Book SynopsisThe worldwide phenomenon from the bestselling author of The Pillars of the Earth, World Without End, A Column of Fire, and The Evening and the MorningHis code name was ?The Needle.? He was a German aristocrat of extraordinary intelligence?a master spy with a legacy of violence in his blood, and the object of the most desperate manhunt in history. . . . But his fate lay in the hands of a young and vulnerable English woman, whose loyalty, if swayed, would assure his freedom?and win the war for the Nazis. . . .
£13.50
Penguin Putnam Inc Triple
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£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc To Cook a Bear
Book SynopsisAN INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER A SUNDAY TIMES UK BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR SHORTLISTED FOR THE CWA CRIME FICTION IN TRANSLATION AWARD“So much to relish here . . . and the writing is just lovely!” —Diane Setterfield, New York Times bestselling author of The Thirteenth Tale and Once Upon a RiverA fantastic tale set in the far north of Sweden in 1852 following a runaway Sami boy and his mentor, the famous pastor Laestadius, as they investigate a murder in their village along with the mysteries of life.Jussi, a runaway, becomes Laestadius''s faithful son and disciple, and the two set out on botanical treks filled with philosophical discussions where Jussi learns all about plants and nature; and also how to read and write and about spirituality. But their quiet days are interrupted when a maid goes missing in the forest. When she is found dead, the locals suspect a predatory bear is at large. The constable is quick to offer a reward for capturing it, but Laestadius sees other traces that point to a far worse killer on the loose. After another maid is severely injured, Jussi and the pastor work to track down the murderer, unaware of the evil that is closing in on them. For it is revivalist times, and impassioned faith spreads like wildfire among the locals. While Laestadius''s powerful Sunday sermons grant salvation to farmers and workers, they gain him enemies among local rulers, who see profits dwindle as people choose revival over alcohol.A completely absorbing and unforgettable novel, To Cook a Bear both entertains and burrows deep down into the great philosophical questions of life.
£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc The Shape of Darkness
Book SynopsisEdgar Award FinalistA struggling silhouette artist in Victorian Bath seeks out a renowned child spirit medium in order to speak to the dead - and to try and identify their killers - in this beguiling new tale from the queen of Gothic fiction, Laura PurcellAs the age of the photograph dawns in Victorian Bath, silhouette artist Agnes is struggling to keep her business afloat. Still recovering from a serious illness herself, making enough money to support her elderly mother and her orphaned nephew Cedric has never been easy, but then one of her clients is murdered shortly after sitting for Agnes, and then another, and another... Why is the killer seemingly targeting her business?Desperately seeking an answer, Agnes approaches Pearl, a child spirit medium lodging in Bath with her older half-sister and her ailing father, hoping that if Pearl can make contact with those who died, they might reveal who killed them. But Agnes and Pearl quickly discover that inste
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc Winter in the Blood
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£19.50
Penguin Putnam Inc My Policeman
Book SynopsisNow a motion picture starring Harry Styles, Emma Corrin, and David Dawson, an exquisitely told, tragic tale of thwarted love.“Stunning…fraught and honest.” —New York Times Book ReviewIt is in 1950's Brighton that Marion first catches sight of Tom. He teaches her to swim, gently guiding her through the water in the shadow of the city's famous pier and Marion is smitten—determined her love alone will be enough for them both. A few years later near the Brighton Museum, Patrick meets Tom. Patrick is besotted, and opens Tom's eyes to a glamorous, sophisticated new world of art, travel, and beauty. Tom is their policeman, and in this age it is safer for him to marry Marion and meet Patrick in secret. The two lovers must share him, until one of them breaks and three lives are destroyed. In this evocative portrait of midcentury England, Bethan Roberts reimagines the real life relationship the novelist E. M. Forster
£11.88
Penguin Putnam Inc Jezebel
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£11.69
Penguin Random House Group The Traitor of Sherwood Forest
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£15.30
Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd Return To Bhanupur
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£11.24
Penguin Random House India Across the Line
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£8.50
Penguin Random House India Muhammad Bin Tughlaq
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£13.25
Penguin Random House India Vichhoda
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£12.56
Penguin Random House India A Gujarat Here a Gujarat There
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£14.99
Penguin Random House India The Blind Matriarch
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£16.79
Penguin Random House India A Firestorm in Paradise
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£26.85
Penguin Random House Daughter of Two Rivers
Book SynopsisHere, Arjuna meets Lilith, the fierce bodyguard to the Queen, and more importantly, a woman who is hell-bent on despising him. But thereâs more to Lilith than meets the eye. The woman is a formidable soldier, but something about her reminds Arjuna of home, of Bharatavarsha.
£13.99
Random House Australia Psykhe
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£14.44
Penguin Random House Australia Good As Gold
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£17.09
Penguin Putnam Inc Audacity
Book SynopsisA 2015 National Jewish Book Award finalistThe inspiring story of Clara Lemlich, whose fight for equal rights led to the largest strike by women in American history A gorgeously told novel in verse written with intimacy and power, Audacity is inspired by the real-life story of Clara Lemlich, a spirited young woman who emigrated from Russia to New York at the turn of the twentieth century and fought tenaciously for equal rights. Bucking the norms of both her traditional Jewish family and societal conventions, Clara refuses to accept substandard working conditions in the factories on Manhattan''s Lower East Side. For years, Clara devotes herself to the labor fight, speaking up for those who suffer in silence. In time, Clara convinces the women in the factories to strike, organize, and unionize, culminating in the famous Uprising of the 20,000. Powerful, breathtaking, and inspiring, Audacity
£11.39
Penguin Putnam Inc Written on My Heart
Book SynopsisThe marriage of Florine Gilham and Bud Warner is a cause for celebration down on The Point, the Maine fishing village where they grew up. Yet even as the newlyweds begin their lives together, Florine is drawn back into the memory of her mother, Carlie, who vanished when Florine was twelve. As unexpected clues regarding her fate begin to surface, Florine and Bud face the challenges of trying to solve an old mystery while building a new marriage and raising a family. Morgan Callan Rogers’s Written on My Heart will delight readers who love feisty, poignant characters and the beautiful, unforgettable Maine coast.
£14.45
Mariner Books A Soldier of the Great War
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£18.69
Cengage Learning, Inc The Whistling Season
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£15.29
Mariner Books The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox
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£17.09
Cengage Learning, Inc Lavinia
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£14.44
Oxford University Press Grettirs Saga Oxford Worlds Classics
Book Synopsis''You will be made an outlaw, forced always to live in the wilds and to live alone.''A sweeping epic of the Viking Age, Grettir''s Saga follows the life of the outlaw Grettir the Strong as he battles against sorcery, bad luck, and the vengefulness of his enemies. Feared by many, Grettir is a warrior and also a poet and a lover, who is afraid of the dark. Unable to resolve the dispute that has outlawed him, he lives outside the bounds of family life and he roams the countryside, ridding Iceland and Norway of berserker warriors, trolls, and the walking dead. The saga presents a poignant story of medieval Icelandic society, combining details of everyday legal disputes with folklore and legend. Written in the fourteenth century, but based on earlier oral and written sources, Grettir''s Saga, with its scathing humour, explicit verses, and fantastic monsters, is among the most famous and widely read of Iceland''s sagas.This new translation features extensive illustrative material to elucidate the story. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
£10.44
Oxford University Press, USA Sangati Events Oxford India Collection Oxford
Book SynopsisA politically and ideologically-charged novel, Sangati creates a Dalit feminist perspective and explores the impact of discrimination - compounded, above all, by poverty - suffered by Dalit women. Marked by rich ethnographic detail, the novel is a significant contribution to Dalit writing in India.Table of ContentsPREFACE; ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS; INTRODUCTION BY LAKSHMI HOLMSTROM; SANGATI; GLOSSARY
£8.24
Oxford University Press Coming Up for Air
Book SynopsisSet at the beginning of the Second World War, Coming Up for Air describes suburban insurance agent George Bowling's return to his birthplace, a sedate Oxfordshire village. This new edition of one of George Orwell's early pre-war works explores the historical and political context of the novel.
£9.49
Oxford University Press Historical Fiction Now
Book SynopsisHistorical Fiction Now brings together prominent authors, scholars, and critics of historical fiction to explore the genre''s character, fortunes, and potential in the twenty-first century. Gathering together the voices of novelists, critics, academics, and several authors writing across these categories, the volume explores the nature of reading, writing, and writing about historical fiction in the present moment while meditating on some of the myriad contexts of the genre. What inspires writers to choose particular moments, events, and personalities as the subjects of their fictional imaginings, and with what implications for their readers'' understanding of the present? How do contemporary scholars approach the making and reception of historical fiction, and how do these approaches resonate with writers'' own preoccupations in the process of invention? What might scholars of a genre with a long and complex history learn from its contemporary practitioners? Conversely, how do novelisTable of ContentsBruce Holsinger: Introduction: Historical Fiction Now I. Inventions 1: George Saunders: Ghosts in a Graveyard 2: Sophie Coulombeau: Naming Names: Reflections on Referentiality in Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall Trilogy 3: David Ebershoff: Looking for the Danish Girl 4: Michael Lackey: Using Versus Doing History in the Contemporary Biographical Novel II. Archives 5: Katherine Howe: Real Witches, Real Life 6: Tiya Miles: Gardens of Memory: Ghosts, Grounds, and the Archives 7: Geraldine Brooks: Pilgrim's Progress: Researching The Secret Chord 8: Namwali Serpell: The Afronaut Archives: Reports from a Future Zambia 9: Bruce Holsinger: Historical Fiction and the Fine Art of Error III. Genres 10: Gavin Jones: Historical Fiction, World-building, and the Short Story 11: Maaza Mengiste: War in a Woman's Voice 12: Mark Eaton: Alternate-history Novels and Other Counterfactual Fictions 13: Téa Obreht: Last Camp 14: Jessie Burton: Historical Impressionism and Signs of Life: The Blessing and Burden of Writing the Past 15: Jane Kamensky: Novelties: A Historian's Field Notes from Fiction 16: Naomi J. Williams: Sorting Fact from Fiction: A Novelist Researches the Lapérouse Expedition 17: Kirstin Chen: Am I Chinese Enough to Tell this Story? The late Hilary Mantel: Afterword: I Met a Man Who Wasn't There
£23.75