|
Historical Fiction October 2020
|
|
|
|
|
The evening and the morning
by Ken Follett
A prequel to the best-selling The Pillars of the Earth follows the experiences of a young boatbuilder, a scholarly monk and a Norman noblewoman against a backdrop of the Viking attacks at the end of the 10th century in England. Maps.
|
|
|
Follow the angels, follow the doves
by Sidney Thompson
"Sidney Thompson tells the story of the early career of one of the greatest deputy U.S. Marshals in American history, Bass Reeves, and his life as a slave before he became a lawman"
|
|
|
Rodham : a novel
by Curtis Sittenfeld
A novel of what-might-have-been follows Hillary Rodham as she takes a different path, blazing her own trail — one that unfolds in public as well as in private — and one that crosses paths again and again with Bill Clinton.
|
|
|
The vanishing half
by Brit Bennett
Separated by their embrace of different racial identities, two mixed-race identical twins reevaluate their choices as one raises a black daughter in their southern hometown while the other passes for white with a husband who is unaware of her heritage.
|
|
|
The Everlasting
by Katy Simpson Smith
What it's about: the multilayered history of life in Rome, told through four complex characters -- a precocious 2nd-century Christian girl (the future Saint Prisca), a penitent 9th-century monk nearing the end of his life, an illegitimate Medici "princess" in an unhappy marriage, and a modern-day biologist having an affair during a research trip to the city.
The hook...is an actual fishing hook that appears across the centuries, whether as a simple tool, a child's treasured possession, or a revered religious relic.
|
|
| The Underground Railroad by Colson WhiteheadThe setting: an antebellum South that looks quite like the one in our reality, only the Underground Railroad literally has train tracks, inspiring the slavecatchers to create increasingly bizarre, elaborate, and disturbing obstacles between escapees and their freedom.
Reviewers say: "Imagine a runaway slave novel written with Joseph Heller's deadpan voice leasing both Frederick Douglass' grim realities and H.P. Lovecraft's rococo fantasies" (Kirkus Reviews). |
|
|
The Gown: A Novel of the Royal Wedding
by Jennifer Robson
What it's about: the friendship between the seamstresses responsible for the intricate embroidery on Princess (soon to be Queen) Elizabeth's wedding dress.
Why you might like it: Parallel narratives, set in 1947 and 2016, converge as a present-day woman solves a family mystery.
You might also like: Liz Trenow's The Forgotten Seamstress, in which vintage clothing similarly connects two women from different eras.
|
|
|
Empire games
by Charles Stross
A tale set in an alternate world of the immediate future follows the efforts of the head of a paratime espionage agency to prepare for an upcoming drone war at the same time her estranged spy daughter attempts to protect national security during an ominous succession crisis.
|
|
|
11/22/63 : a novel
by Stephen King
Receiving a horrific essay from a GED student with a traumatic past, high-school English teacher Jake Epping is enlisted by a friend to travel back in time to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy, a mission for which he must reacclimate to 1960s culture and befriend troubled loner Lee Harvey Oswald. By the best-selling author of Full Dark, No Stars.
|
|
|
The calculating stars
by Mary Robinette Kowal
On a cold spring night in 1952, a huge meteorite fell to earth and obliterated much of the east coast of the United States, including Washington D.C. The ensuing climate cataclysm will soon render the earth inhospitable for humanity, as the last such meteorite did for the dinosaurs. This looming threat calls for a radically accelerated effort to colonize space, and requires a much larger share of humanity to take part in the process. Elma York's experience as a WASP pilot and mathematician earns her a place in the International Aerospace Coalition's attempts to put man on the moon, as a calculator. But with so many skilled and experienced women pilots and scientists involved with the program, it doesn't take long before Elma begins to wonder why they can't go into space, too. Elma's drive to become the first Lady Astronaut is so strong that even the most dearly held conventions of society may not stand a chance against her
|
|
Contact your librarian for more great books!
|
|
|
|
|
|