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Historical FictionApril 2016
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"But by the end of that summer, I would come to see things differently. I would be troubled by my entertainment, played for a fool. I would be the puppet in a rich man's grim comedy." ~ from Timothy Schaffert's The Swan Gondola
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| Carry Me: A Novel by Peter BehrensTwo families, two world wars, one unforgettable love story. Billy Lange's parents are the caretakers of Sanssouci, the country estate of German-Jewish industrialist Baron von Weinbrenner, whose daughter Karin befriends Billy during summers on the Isle of Wight. As children in late Edwardian England, they bond over Westerns while dreaming of life in America; as adults in 1930s Frankfurt, they become lovers who enjoy the city's vibrant nightlife. But the couple -- neither English nor German, but with complicated loyalties to both nations -- find themselves caught in the middle of a global conflict when World War II begins. |
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America's First Daughter
by Stephanie Dray
A carefully researched tale based on thousands of original sources imagines the experiences of third American President's daughter Patsy, who while accompanying her father to Paris struggles with his past affair with a slave and falls in love with his protégé against a backdrop of a growing revolution.
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| News of the World: A Novel by Paulette JilesItinerant veteran Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd earns his living by giving public readings from newspapers to rural audiences with an interest in current events. After one such performance, he's offered a $50 gold piece to escort ten-year-old Johanna from Wichita Falls to San Antonio. Rescued by the U.S. Army, which has decided to send her to relatives in Texas, Johanna has spent the past four years in captivity since Kiowa raiders killed her family. She has forgotten her English, but demonstrates her unwillingness to accompany Kidd by escaping at every turn. It's not the most promising beginning to a friendship, yet a strong bond develops between Kidd and Johanna as they endure many trials on their journey. |
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The other side of silence
by Philip Kerr
Approached by famous writer W. Somerset Maugham to help defend against a blackmailer who knows dangerous secrets, Berlin homicide detective and unwilling SS officer Bernie Gunther follows leads back to Hitler's Third Reich and the development of the bomb in Russia.
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The North water : a novel
by Ian McGuire
The Volunteer, a nineteenth-century Yorkshire whaling ship, sets sail with a killer aboard. In a dark, historical thriller, the Volunteer becomes the stage for a confrontation between brutal harpooner Henry Drax and ex-army surgeon Patrick Sumner, the ship's medic, during a violent, ill-fated voyage to the Arctic.
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Chasing the North Star : a novel
by Robert Morgan
Fleeing the South Carolina plantation where he has spent his entire life, 18-year-old slave Jonah Williams uses the stars to escape to the North and is pursued by both slave hunters and a free-spirited fellow slave who believes Jonah can help her secure her own freedom.
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Sisi : Empress on her own : a novel
by Allison Pataki
A tale inspired by the life of Empress Sisi in 19th-century Vienna places such events as the opening of the Suez Canal, Vienna's World Exhibition and the outbreak of World War I against a backdrop of imperial court temptations, rivalries and cutthroat intrigues.
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| The Moon in the Palace by Weina Dai RandelWhen her father dies and her family is cast out of their home, 12-year-old Mei believes that her life is over. In fact, it's just beginning. Soon Mei receives a summons from the palace, informing her that she's been chosen to serve as one of 15 maidens of Emperor Taizong's Inner Court. To survive this new life, she must navigate palace intrigues and win the Emperor's favor, but when she falls in love with his son, she risks losing everything she's worked for. Based on the life of China's Empress Wu, The Moon in the Palace is the 1st book in a duology; keep an eye out for the upcoming sequel, Empress of Bright Moon. |
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| Scarpia: A Novel by Piers Paul ReadInspired by Puccini's opera Tosca, this novel -- set against the backdrop of Napoleon's invasion of Italy -- introduces Sicilian nobleman-turned-soldier Vitellio Scarpia and describes the events leading up to his fateful encounter with singer Floria Tosca, as well as the tragic consequences of that meeting. For more opera-themed fiction, try Angela Davis-Garner's Butterfly's Child, a sequel to Puccini's Madama Butterfly. If you're inclined to sympathize with the villain of a story (or just think they've gotten a bad rap), check out Nicole Galland's I, Iago. |
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The Hourglass Factory
by Lucy Ribchester
When a famous trapeze artist disappears in the middle of her act, a young Fleet Street reporter and a police inspector are drawn into the shadowy world of a secret society with ties to early 20th-century London's criminal underworld and its glittering socialites.
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| Behave: A Novel by Andromeda Romano-LaxUpon graduating from Vassar with a degree in psychology, Rosalie Rayner accepts a job at John Hopkins in the lab of behaviorism pioneer John B. Watson. Their professional collaboration results in the controversial "Little Albert" experiments, in which they expose an infant to distressing stimuli, while their personal connection leads to an affair. Watson, fired by the university for misconduct, becomes an advertising executive; Rosalie marries him and raises their two children in accordance with their research findings. But the realities of motherhood force Rosalie to reconsider her perspective on parenting and causes her to question the foundations of her marriage. |
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The weeping woman : a novel
by Zoé Valdés
Winner of the prestigious Azori Prize for Fiction, the best-selling novel about love, sacrifice, and Picasso's mistress, Dora Maar. A writer resembling Zoé Valdés--a Cuban exile living in Paris with her husband and young daughter-is preparing a novel on the life of Dora Maar, one of the most promising artists in the Surrealist movement until she met Pablo Picasso. The middle-aged Picasso was already the god of the art world's avant-garde. Dora became his lover, muse, and ultimately, his victim. She became The Weeping Woman captured in his famous portrait, the mistress he betrayed with other mistress-muses, and their affair ended with her commitment to an asylum at the hands of Picasso's friends. The writer's research centers on a mysterious trip to Venice that Dora took fifteen years later, in the company of two young gay men who were admirers of Picasso, including the biographer James Lord. After this episode, Dora cut off contact with the world and secluded herself in her Paris apartment until her death. "After Picasso, God," she would say.
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| The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb: A Novel by Melanie BenjaminAlthough she stands just two feet, eight inches tall, Mercy Lavinia "Vinnie" Warren Bump's personality is larger-than-life. Wishing to expand her horizons, she abandons her schoolteacher job and joins an unsavory talent promoter's riverboat show. This gig ends abruptly with the start of the Civil War, but her subsequent association with impresario P.T. Barnum proves more enduring. Although Vinnie makes headlines with her marriage to fellow small-statured celebrity Charles Stratton (aka "General Tom Thumb"), she finds her intellectual soul mate in Barnum. This novel unfolds from Vinnie's point of view; readers interested in her husband's perspective on thir relationship should try Nicholas Rinaldi's The Remarkable Courtship of General Tom Thumb. |
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| The Museum of Extraordinary Things: A Novel by Alice HoffmanThe daughter of Coney Island impresario Professor Sardie, web-fingered Coralie grows up in The Museum of Extraordinary Things, which exhibits the "living wonders" that her father collects. Eventually (and reluctantly), she joins their ranks as a "mermaid," performing dangerous aquatic feats for crowds of novelty-seekers. Meanwhile, Russian immigrant Ezekiel "Eddie" Cohen flees his strict Orthodox Jewish community on the Lower East Side to pursue his dream of becoming a photographer. Coralie and Eddie's chance meeting on the banks of the Hudson river leads to romance and rebellion as the lovers decide to forge their own paths in life. |
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| Church of Marvels by Leslie ParryAfter a fire consumes their mother's Coney Island sideshow, the Church of Marvels, teen sword-swallower Belle Church disappears, prompting her twin sister, Odile, to search for her. Meanwhile, an abandoned infant sends cleaner Sylvan Threadgill on a quest to reunite the child with its mother, and Alphie, confined to a lunatic asylum on Blackwell Island, concocts increasingly desperate escape plans. These individual narrative strands converge to make this richly detailed novel, set in a gritty 1895 New York City, an unforgettable experience. |
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| The Swan Gondola by Timothy SchaffertDuring the 1898 Omaha World's Fair, ventriloquist Bartholomew "Ferret" Skerritt meets and falls in love with Cecily, the actress who plays Marie Antoinette (pre- and post-guillotine) in the Midway's Chamber of Horrors exhibit. Despite a rocky beginning to their courtship, a moonlight ride on one of the fair's celebrated swan gondolas leads to romance. But the course of true love never did run smooth, as they discover when wealthy widower William Wakefield decides that he wants Cecily for himself. Whimsical and leisurely paced, this bittersweet novel vividly depicts an American society poised on the cusp of a new century. |
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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Prince George's County Memorial Library System 9601 Capital Lane Largo, Maryland 20774 301-699-3500www.pgcmls.info/ |
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