Collection: Historical Fiction

WINNER OF A NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD
A USA TODAY BESTSELLER

"A gifted writer, astonishingly adept at nuance, narration, and the politics of passion."--Toni Morrison

Set in London of the 1660s and of the early twenty-first century, The Weight of Ink is the interwoven tale of two women of remarkable intellect: Ester Velasquez, an emigrant from Amsterdam who is permitted to scribe for a blind rabbi, just before the plague hits the city; and Helen Watt, an ailing historian with a love of Jewish history.

When Helen is summoned by a former student to view a cache of newly discovered seventeenth-century Jewish documents, she enlists the help of Aaron Levy, an American graduate student as impatient as he is charming, and embarks on one last project: to determine the identity of the documents' scribe, the elusive "Aleph."

Electrifying and ambitious, The Weight of Ink is about women separated by centuries--and the choices and sacrifices they must make in order to reconcile the life of the heart and mind.

This stunning wordless graphic novel follows a young girl in the 1960s who immigrates from Cuba to the United States and must redefine what home means to her.

Marisol loves her colorful island home. Cuba is vibrant with flowers and food and people...but things are changing. The home Marisol loves is no longer safe--and then it's no longer her home at all. Her parents are sending her to the United States. Alone.

Nothing about Marisol's new life in cold, gray Brooklyn feels like home--not the language, school, or even her foster parents. But Marisol starts to realize that home isn't always a place. And finding her way can be as simple as staying true to herself.

This complete set of Jane Austen novels makes a beautiful decoration for any home library.

Jane Austen's stories of clever women, elusive love, and social mores have struck a chord with millions of fans who consider her work compelling, heartwarming, and essential. Adapted time and again for screen and stage, these enduring classics remain as enjoyable as ever. This elegant, colorful collection includes Austen's acclaimed novels: Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Emma, Mansfield Park, Persuasion, and Northanger Abbey. Readers will be enchanted by these stories and by the decorative books in this set, which include specially designed spines and custom endpapers. These books aren't just for your bookshelf. They're a beautiful way to add color and style to a room. Just like they do with Jane Austen's memorable characters, readers and interior design aficionados will fall in love with these beautiful novels.

From the New York Times and #1 internationally bestselling author of Homecoming, The Distant Hours, The Forgotten Garden, and The House at Riverton comes a spellbinding novel of family secrets, murder, and enduring love.

During a picnic at her family's farm in the English countryside, sixteen-year-old Laurel Nicolson witnesses a shocking crime, a crime that challenges everything she knows about her adored mother, Dorothy. Now, fifty years later, Laurel and her sisters are meeting at the farm to celebrate Dorothy's ninetieth birthday. Realizing that this is her last chance to discover the truth about that long-ago day, Laurel searches for answers that can only be found in Dorothy's past. Clue by clue, she traces a secret history of three strangers from vastly different worlds thrown together in war-torn London--Dorothy, Vivien, and Jimmy--whose lives are forever after entwined. A gripping story of deception and passion, The Secret Keeper will keep you enthralled to the last page.

A Caldecott Honor Book based on a Japanese folktale and highlighted by Allen Say's beautiful art.

Lazy Taro gets his comeuppance when his wise mother uses his trick to avoid work to her own advantage.

"The pictures, handsome in every respect, are done in Japanese style, and complement a well-crafted story." (Booklist; starred review)

Short-Listed for the 2023 Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction
Named a Top 10 Best Book of 2023 by The Wall Street Journal
Named a Best Book of 2023 by Kirkus and Chicago Public Library

"The Sun Walks Down is the book I'm always longing to find: brilliant, fresh, and compulsively readable. It is marvelous. I loved it start to finish." --Ann Patchett, author of The Dutch House

Fiona McFarlane's blazingly brilliant new novel, The Sun Walks Down, tells the many-voiced, many-sided story of a boy lost in colonial Australia.

In September 1883, a small town in the South Australian outback huddles under strange, vivid sunsets. Six-year-old Denny Wallace has gone missing during a dust storm, and the entire community is caught up in the search for him. As they scour the desert and mountains for the lost child, the residents of Fairly--newlyweds, farmers, mothers, Indigenous trackers, cameleers, children, artists, schoolteachers, widows, maids, policemen--confront their relationships, both with one another and with the land-scape they inhabit.

The colonial Australia of The Sun Walks Down is noisy with opinions, arguments, longings, and terrors. It's haunted by many gods--the sun among them, rising and falling on each day in which Denny could be found, or lost forever.

Told in many ways and by many voices, Fiona McFarlane's new novel pulses with love, art, and the unbearable divine. It arrives like a vision, mythic and bright with meaning.

From the New York Times bestselling author of Mexican Gothic comes a sweeping romance with a dash of magic.

They are the Beautiful Ones, Loisail's most notable socialites, and this spring is Nina's chance to join their ranks, courtesy of her well-connected cousin and his calculating wife. But the Grand Season has just begun, and already Nina's debut has gone disastrously awry. She has always struggled to control her telekinesis--neighbors call her the Witch of Oldhouse--and the haphazard manifestations of her powers make her the subject of malicious gossip.

When entertainer Hector Auvray arrives to town, Nina is dazzled. A telekinetic like her, he has traveled the world performing his talents for admiring audiences. He sees Nina not as a witch, but ripe with potential to master her power under his tutelage. With Hector's help, Nina's talent blossoms, as does her love for him.

But great romances are for fairytales, and Hector is hiding a truth from Nina -- and himself--that threatens to end their courtship before it truly begins.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia's The Beautiful Ones is a charming tale of love and betrayal, and the struggle between conformity and passion, set in a world where scandal is a razor-sharp weapon.

Midwife Sarah Malloy and her private detective husband Frank discover that the cure is worse than the disease when they investigate the death of a promising young woman in this atmospheric, riveting mystery from the USA TODAY bestselling author of Murder on Bedford Street.

Sarah Malloy has just helped with the delivery of a bouncing baby girl at her women's clinic, when she receives a visit from an engaging and determined young woman writing an article for New Century Magazine. Louisa Rodgers explains that she is researching the dangers of patent remedies. Sarah is only too happy to tell Louisa exactly what she thinks of the so-called medicines whose ingredients include heavy doses of alcohol and other addictive drugs, and hurt much more than they help.

A few days later, Sarah receives a visit from a bereft Bernard Rodgers, who explains that his daughter, Louisa, has been found strangled in the lobby of the building where New Century has its offices. The police have decided it was a random attack and have made no attempt to investigate, hinting that Louisa got what she deserved for sticking her nose where it didn't belong. Sarah wants justice for the bright young woman but as she and Frank delve deeper into Louisa's life, they find that nothing is quite as it seemed and Louisa is not who she claimed to be. The Malloys must first solve the mystery of Louisa's life before they can figure out who wanted to see her dead...

Combining "fast-paced historical fiction with a hint of suspense" (Booklist), this epic saga from Julia Kelly explores love, motherhood, and betrayal set against World War II.

Liverpool, 1935: Raised in a strict Catholic family, Viv Byrne knows what's expected of her: marry a Catholic man from her working-class neighborhood and have his children. However, when she finds herself pregnant after a fling with Joshua Levinson, a Jewish man with dreams of becoming a famous jazz musician, Viv knows that a swift wedding is the only answer. Her only solace is that marrying Joshua will mean escaping her strict mother's scrutiny. But when Joshua makes a life-changing choice on their wedding day, Viv is forced once again into the arms of her disapproving family.

Five years later and on the eve of World War II, Viv is faced with the impossible choice to evacuate her young daughter, Maggie, to the countryside. In New York City, Joshua gives up his failing musical career to serve in the Royal Air Force and try to piece together his feelings about the family he left behind. However, tragedy strikes when Viv learns that the countryside safe haven she sent her daughter to wasn't immune from the horrors of war. It is only years later, with Joshua's help, that Viv learns the secrets of their shared past and what it will take to put a family back together again.

Telling the harrowing story of England's many evacuated children, Kelly's The Lost English Girl "will hook readers from the first page" (Publishers Weekly, starred review).

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - The author of The Aviator's Wife returns with a triumphant new novel about New York's "Swans" of the 1950s--and the scandalous, headline-making, and enthralling friendship between literary legend Truman Capote and peerless socialite Babe Paley.

People's Book of the Week - USA Today's #1 "New and Noteworthy" Book - Entertainment Weekly's Must List - LibraryReads Top Ten Pick

Of all the glamorous stars of New York high society, none blazes brighter than Babe Paley. Her flawless face regularly graces the pages of Vogue, and she is celebrated and adored for her ineffable style and exquisite taste, especially among her friends--the alluring socialite Swans Slim Keith, C. Z. Guest, Gloria Guinness, and Pamela Churchill. By all appearances, Babe has it all: money, beauty, glamour, jewels, influential friends, a prestigious husband, and gorgeous homes. But beneath this elegantly composed exterior dwells a passionate woman--a woman desperately longing for true love and connection.

Enter Truman Capote. This diminutive golden-haired genius with a larger-than-life personality explodes onto the scene, setting Babe and her circle of Swans aflutter. Through Babe, Truman gains an unlikely entrée into the enviable lives of Manhattan's elite, along with unparalleled access to the scandal and gossip of Babe's powerful circle. Sure of the loyalty of the man she calls "True Heart," Babe never imagines the destruction Truman will leave in his wake. But once a storyteller, always a storyteller--even when the stories aren't his to tell.

Truman's fame is at its peak when such notable celebrities as Frank and Mia Sinatra, Lauren Bacall, and Rose Kennedy converge on his glittering Black and White Ball. But all too soon, he'll ignite a literary scandal whose repercussions echo through the years. The Swans of Fifth Avenue will seduce and startle readers as it opens the door onto one of America's most sumptuous eras.

Praise for The Swans of Fifth Avenue

"Exceptional storytelling . . . teeming with scandal, gossip and excitement."--Harper's Bazaar

"This moving fictionalization brings the whole cast of characters back to vivid life. Gossipy and fun, it's also a nuanced look at the beauty and cruelty of a rarefied, bygone world."--People

"The era and the sordid details come back to life in this jewel of a novel."--O: The Oprah Magazine

The worldwide bestseller by the author of The Alchemist takes us on a journey back in time, from South America to Holland to Nepal, drawing on the rich experiences of his own life to relive the dreams of a generation that longs for peace. - "A novelist who writes in a universal language." --Los Angeles Times

In Hippie, he tells the story of Paulo, a young, skinny Brazilian man with a goatee and long, flowing hair, who dreams of becoming a writer, and Karla, a Dutch woman in her twenties who has been waiting to find a companion to accompany her on the fabled hippie trail to Nepal.

After meeting each other in Amsterdam, she convinces Paulo to join her on a trip aboard the Magic Bus that travels from Amsterdam to Istanbul and across Central Asia to Kathmandu. As they embark on this journey together, Paulo and Karla explore a love affair that awakens them on every level and leads to choices and decisions that will set the course for their lives thereafter.

PULITZER PRIZE WINNER - NATIONAL BESTSELLER - This follow-up to The Underground Railroad brilliantly dramatizes another strand of American history through the story of two boys unjustly sentenced to a hellish reform school in Jim Crow-era Florida. - "One of the most gifted novelists in America today." --NPR

When Elwood Curtis, a black boy growing up in 1960s Tallahassee, is unfairly sentenced to a juvenile reformatory called the Nickel Academy, he finds himself trapped in a grotesque chamber of horrors. Elwood's only salvation is his friendship with fellow "delinquent" Turner, which deepens despite Turner's conviction that Elwood is hopelessly naive, that the world is crooked, and that the only way to survive is to scheme and avoid trouble. As life at the Academy becomes ever more perilous, the tension between Elwood's ideals and Turner's skepticism leads to a decision whose repercussions will echo down the decades.

Based on the real story of a reform school that operated for 111 years and warped the lives of thousands of children, The Nickel Boys is a devastating, driven narrative that showcases a great American novelist writing at the height of his powers and "should further cement Whitehead as one of his generation's best" (Entertainment Weekly).

Look for Colson Whitehead's new novel, Crook Manifesto, coming soon!

Winner of the 2001 Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction

The New York Times bestselling author of Dread Nation makes her middle grade debut with a sweeping tale of the ghosts of our past that won't stay buried, starring an unforgettable girl named Ophie.

Ophelia Harrison used to live in a small house in the Georgia countryside. But that was before the night in November 1922, and the cruel act that took her home and her father from her. Which was the same night that Ophie learned she can see ghosts.

Now Ophie and her mother are living in Pittsburgh with relatives they barely know. In the hopes of earning enough money to get their own place, Mama has gotten Ophie a job as a maid in the same old manor house where she works.

Daffodil Manor, like the wealthy Caruthers family who owns it, is haunted by memories and prejudices of the past--and, as Ophie discovers, ghosts as well. Ghosts who have their own loves and hatreds and desires, ghosts who have wronged others and ghosts who have themselves been wronged. And as Ophie forms a friendship with one spirit whose life ended suddenly and unjustly, she wonders if she might be able to help--even as she comes to realize that Daffodil Manor may hold more secrets than she bargained for.

The unflinching, spellbinding new book from the acclaimed author of The Second Life of Mirielle West. Based on the little-known story of America's first nursing school, a young female grifter in 1880s New York evades the police by conning her way into Bellevue Hospital's training school for nurses, while a spate of murders continues to follow her as she tries to leave the gritty streets of the city behind...

"A spellbinding story, a vividly drawn setting, and characters that leap off the pages. This is historical fiction at its finest!" - Sara Ackerman, USA Today bestselling author of The Codebreaker's Secret

BookBub's Best Historical Fiction of Summer

Based on Florence Nightingale's nursing principles, Bellevue is the first school of its kind in the country. Where once nurses were assumed to be ignorant and unskilled, Bellevue prizes discipline, intellect, and moral character, and only young women of good breeding need apply. At first, Una balks at her prim classmates and the doctors' endless commands. Yet life on the streets has prepared her for the horrors of injury and disease found on the wards, and she slowly gains friendship and self-respect.

Just as she finds her footing, Una's suspicions about a patient's death put her at risk of exposure, and will force her to choose between her instinct for self-preservation, and exposing her identity in order to save others.

Amanda Skenandore brings her medical expertise to a page-turning story that explores the evolution of modern nursing--including the grisly realities of nineteenth-century medicine--as seen through the eyes of an intriguing and dynamic heroine.

PRAISE FOR AMANDA SKENANDORE'S THE SECOND LIFE OF MIRIELLE WEST

"In this superior historical, the author's diligent research, as well as her empathetic depiction of those subjected to forced medical isolation, make this a winner." --Publishers Weekly

Cora Moffat is struggling to concentrate on her English class when her teacher's focus lands on a classroom window. As the class turns to look, they see an enormous black cloud, angry and vicious, heading their direction. When the devastating tornado hits the school, Cora does all she can to help herself and others survive the destruction and make it out of the building alive. Readers can learn the real story of the Tri-State Tornado from the nonfiction back matter in this Girls Survive story. A glossary, discussion questions, and writing prompts are also provided.

Award-winning author-illustrator Duncan Tonatiuh sheds light on the significance of Aztec manuscripts and culture in his picture book A Land of Books.

A 2023 Pura Belpré Youth Illustration Honor Book

Our world, little brother, is an amoxtlalpan, a land of books.
In the jungles where the jaguar dwells, the Mayas make books.
In the mountains the cloud people, the Mixtecs, make them as well. So do others in the coast and in the forests.
And we the Mexica of the mighty Aztec empire, who dwell in the valley of the volcanoes, make them too.

A young Aztec girl tells her little brother how their parents create beautiful painted manuscripts, or codices. She explains to him how paper is made from local plants and how the long paper is folded into a book. Her parents and others paint the codices to tell the story of their people's way of life, documenting their history, science, tributes, and sacred rituals.

Duncan Tonatiuh's lyrical prose and beloved illustration style, inspired by the pre-Columbian codices, tell the story of how--contrary to the historical narrative that European colonizers bestowed "civilization" and knowledge to the Americas--the Aztec and their neighbors in the Valley of Mexico painted books and records long before Columbus arrived, and continued doing so among their Nahua-speaking descendants for generations after the Spanish Conquest. From an award-winning author-illustrator, A Land of Books pays tribute to Mesoamerican ingenuity and celebrates the universal power of books.