Collection: Historical Fiction

The Memoirs of a Polar Bear has in spades what Rivka Galchen hailed in the New Yorker as "Yoko Tawada's magnificent strangeness"--Tawada is an author like no other. Three generations (grandmother, mother, son) of polar bears are famous as both circus performers and writers in East Germany: they are polar bears who move in human society, stars of the ring and of the literary world. In chapter one, the grandmother matriarch in the Soviet Union accidentally writes a bestselling autobiography. In chapter two, Tosca, her daughter (born in Canada, where her mother had emigrated) moves to the DDR and takes a job in the circus. Her son--the last of their line--is Knut, born in chapter three in a Leipzig zoo but raised by a human keeper in relatively happy circumstances in the Berlin zoo, until his keeper, Matthias, is taken away...

Happy or sad, each bear writes a story, enjoying both celebrity and "the intimacy of being alone with my pen."

"One of today's leading lights in romantic fiction."

--Seattle Times

USA Today and New York Times bestselling author Lisa Kleypas is one of America's most acclaimed and popular authors of historical romance fiction--and Stranger in My Arms is one of her most beloved novels! A classic tale of a noble lady whose life is upended when her despised husband--believed lost at sea--returns, a remarkably altered, more passionate and loving man...if he is, indeed, who he claims to be. A two-time RITA Award-winner--and a nine-time nominee--Lisa Kleypas is at her sensuous best with Stranger in My Arms.

Ballycreggan, Northern Ireland, 1955

Erich Bannon is happy in the small Irish village he has thought of as home since he arrived as a terrified, traumatised seven year old, one of the last Jewish children to escape Berlin in 1939. Now at twenty-three, it feels like all of his friends are drawn to The Promised Land, and he can understand why, but Israel is not for him.

One by one, they leave, and Erich is bereft. He feels lost but a chance encounter with an Irish Catholic girl gives him hope. All he and Róisín want is to be allowed to love each other but the traditions and rules of their backgrounds forbid it. By the time he learns that Róisín wasn't honest with him about her family, and what kind of people they really are, it is too late and he finds himself unwittingly embroiled in a dangerous world from which there seems to be no escape.

When Róisín disappears, events take a sinister turn and Erich wonders if their relationship really was all he thought it was.. Reluctant to place his family in danger, he has to solve his problems alone, something he's never had to do before. From rural Ireland, to the glitz of 1950's America, from the orange groves of Israel to the dark streets of post-war Liverpool, The World Starts Anew, is the fourth book in the best-selling Star and the Shamrock series.

Ahora una serie de Netflix.

Nueva edición del gran fenómeno editorial: La catedral del mar, de Ildefonso Falcones, con prólogo del autor.

Una catedral construida por el pueblo y para el pueblo en la Barcelona medieval es el escenario de una apasionante historia de intriga, violencia y pasión.

Siglo XIV. La ciudad de Barcelona se encuentra en su momento de mayor prosperidad; ha crecido hacia la Ribera, el humilde barrio de los pescadores, cuyos habitantes deciden construir, con el dinero de unos y el esfuerzo de otros, el mayor templo mariano jamás conocido: Santa María de la Mar.

Una construcción que es paralela a la azarosa historia de Arnau, un siervo de la tierra que huye de los abusos de su señor feudal y se refugia en Barcelona, donde se convierte en ciudadano y, con ello, en hombre libre.

El joven Arnau trabaja como palafrenero, estibador, soldado y cambista. Una vida extenuante, siempre al amparo de la catedral de la mar, que le iba a llevar de la miseria del fugitivo a la nobleza y la riqueza. Pero con esta posición privilegiada también le llega la envidia de sus pares, que urden una sórdida conjura que pone su vida en manos de la Inquisición.

La catedral del mar es una trama en la que se entrecruzan lealtad y venganza, traición y amor, guerra y peste, en un mundo marcado por la intolerancia religiosa, la ambición material y la segregación social. Todo ello convierte esta obra no sólo en una novela absorbente, sino también en la más fascinante y ambiciosa recreación de las luces y sombras de la época feudal.

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Now a Netflix Series.

An unforgettable fresco of a golden age in fourteenth-century Barcelona, Cathedral of the Sea is a thrilling historical novel of friendship and revenge, plague and hope, love and war.

Arnau Estanyol arrives in Barcelona to find a city dominated by the construction of the city's great pride--the cathedral of Santa Maria del Mar--and by its shame, the deadly Inquisition. As a young man, Arnau joins the powerful guild of stoneworkers and helps to build the church with his own hands, while his best friend and adopted brother Joanet studies to become a priest.

With time, Arnau prospers and falls secretly in love with a forbidden woman. But when he is betrayed and hauled before the Inquisitor, he finds himself face-to-face with Joanet. Will he lose his life just as his beloved Cathedral of the Sea is finally completed, or will his brother save him?

Enter the strange and haunting world of Anna Kavan, author of mind-bending stories that blend science fiction and the author's own harrowing experiences with drug addiction, in this new collection of her best short stories.

Anna Kavan is one of the great originals of twentieth-century fiction, comparable to Leonora Carrington and Jean Rhys, a writer whose stories explored the inner world of her imagination and plumbed the depths of her long addiction to heroin. This new selection of Kavan's stories gathers the best work from across the many decades of her career, including oblique and elegiac tales of breakdown and institutionalization from Asylum Piece (1940), moving evocations of wartime from I Am Lazarus (1945), fantastic and surrealist pieces from A Bright Green Field (1958), and stories of addiction from Julia and the Bazooka (1970). Kavan's turn to science fiction in her final novel, Ice, is reflected in her late stories, while "Starting a Career," about a mercenary dealer of state secrets, is published here for the first time.

Kavan experimented throughout her writing career with results that are moving, funny, bizarre, poignant, often unsettling, always unique. Machines in the Head offers American readers the first full overview of the work of a fearless and dazzling literary explorer.

"José [Barreiro] writes the true story in Taíno--the Native view of what Columbus brought. Across the Americas, invasion, and resistance, the Taíno story repeated many times over." - Chief Oren Lyons (Joagquisho), Turtle Clan, Onondaga Nation The story of what really happened when Columbus arrived in the "New World," as told by the Taíno people who were impacted In 1532, an elderly Taíno man named Guaikán sits down to write his story--an in-depth account of what happened when Columbus landed on Caribbean shores in 1492. As a boy, Guaikán was adopted by Columbus, uniquely positioning him to tell the story of Columbus's "discovery," directing our gaze where it rightfully belongs--on the Indigenous people for whom this land had long been home. Revised and updated by author José Barreiro (himself a descendant of the Taíno people) with new information and a new introduction, this richly imagined novel updates Guaikán's carefully crafted narrative, chronicling what happened to the Taíno people when Columbus arrived and how their lives and culture were ruptured. Through Guaikán's story, Barreiro penetrates the veil that still clouds the "discovery" of the Americas and in turn gives

Together for the first time, all 5 standalone novels from the Hugo and Nebula award-winning writer who reinvented science fiction, including one restored to print

Spans from the 1971 classic The Lathe of Heaven to her career-crowning 2008 masterpiece Lavinia

This 7th volume in the definitive Library of America edition of Ursula K. Le Guin's works presents 5 remarkable standalone novels that showcase her boundless creativity and literary range.

In the Locus Award-winning The Lathe of Heaven (1971), one of Le Guin's most admired works of science fiction, George Orr begins have effective dreams: dreams that change reality itself. But when he turns to the sleep researcher William Haber for help, the doctor sees an opportunity to use Orr's strange gift for his own ends.

A former Terran prison colony on the planet Victoria seems destined for revolution in The Eye of the Heron (1978), when the authoritarian leaders in the City try to assert control over the peaceful farmers who have been sent to live around them.

The Beginning Place (1980) is a parable-like story in which Hugh and Irena have both found their way to the Beginning Place, a gateway to another world. The two initially become enemies, but must learn to work together when the utopia they've found turns out to have a shadow.

The long out-of-print Searoad: Chronicles of Klatsand (1991) is a Winesburg, Ohio-like series of linked stories set in a small vacation town on the Oregon coast, where some of the characters have come for a weekend and some for longer, but all are pilgrims in the grip of inexpressible longings.

And Le Guin's final, powerfully feminist novel, Lavinia (2008), reimagines Virgil's Aeneid from the perspective of a woman who, in poet's telling, never speaks a word.

Special features include an appendix presenting three essays by Le Guin related to the novels, previously unseen hand-drawn maps by author herself, helpful annotation, and a chronology of Le Guin's life and career.

Brought together here for the first time, these 5 remarkable standalone novels showcase a Hugo and Nebula Award-winning master at her very best.

Winner of the Lost Man Booker Prize, this darkly hilarious book about the Irish war for independence takes place in a crumbling hotel on Ireland's west coast, a place where madness and brutality have begun to reign.

1919: After surviving the Great War, Major Brendan Archer makes his way to Ireland, hoping to discover whether he is indeed betrothed to Angela Spencer, whose Anglo-Irish family owns the once-aptly-named Majestic Hotel in Kilnalough. But his fiancée is strangely altered and her family's fortunes have suffered a spectacular decline. The hotel's hundreds of rooms are disintegrating on a grand scale; its few remaining guests thrive on rumors and games of whist; herds of cats have taken over the Imperial Bar and the upper stories; bamboo shoots threaten the foundations; and piglets frolic in the squash court. Meanwhile, the Major is captivated by the beautiful and bitter Sarah Devlin. As housekeeping disasters force him from room to room, outside the order of the British Empire also totters: there is unrest in the East, and in Ireland itself the mounting violence of "the troubles."

Troubles is a hilarious and heartbreaking work by a modern master of the historical novel.

The secret is hidden within a collection of Dior dresses...

London, 2017. There's no one Lucille adores more than her grandmother. So when her beloved Granny Sylvie asks for Lucille's assistance with a small matter, she's happy to help. The next thing she knows, Lucille is on a train to Paris, tasked with retrieving a priceless Dior dress. But not everything is as it seems, and what Lucille finds in a small Parisian apartment will have her scouring the city for answers to a question that could change her entire life.

Paris, 1952. Postwar France is full of glamour and privilege, and Alice Ainsley is in the middle of it all. As the wife to the British ambassador to France, Alice's job is to see and be seen--even if that wasn't quite what she signed up for. Her husband showers her with jewels, banquets, and couture Dior dresses, but his affection has become distressingly elusive. As the strain on her marriage grows, Alice's only comfort is her bond with her trusted lady's maid, Marianne. But when a new face appears in her drawing room, Alice finds herself yearning to follow her heart...no matter the consequences.

The City of Light comes alive in this lush, evocative tale that explores the ties that bind us together, the truths we hold that make us who we are, and the true meaning of what makes someone family.

ONE OF THE WASHINGTON POST'S BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR - The dark, gripping tale of a 1930's family in the remote hills of the Smoky Mountains, their secret religion, and the daughter who turns her back on their mysterious god--from the acclaimed author of Spoonbenders.

"Gods and moonshine in the Great Depression, written with a tenderness and brutality ... this is as good as novels get." --Stephen Graham Jones, author of The Only Good Indians

In 1933, nine-year-old Stella is left in the care of her grandmother, Motty, in the backwoods of Tennessee. The mountains are home to dangerous secrets, and soon after she arrives, Stella wanders into a dark cavern where she encounters the family's personal god, an entity known as the Ghostdaddy.

Years later, after a tragic incident that caused her to flee, Stella--now a professional bootlegger--returns for Motty's funeral, and to check on the mysterious ten-year-old girl named Sunny that Motty adopted. Sunny appears innocent enough, but she is more powerful than Stella could imagine--and she's a direct link to Stella's buried past and her family's destructive faith.

Haunting and wholly engrossing, summoning mesmerizing voices and giving shape to the dark, Revelator is a southern gothic tale for the ages.

Family is power. The Original vampire family swore it to each other a thousand years ago. They pledged to remain together always and forever. But even when you're immortal, promises are hard to keep.

After a hurricane destroyed their city, Klaus, Elijah and Rebekah Mikaelson have rebuilt New Orleans to even greater glory. The year is 1766. The witches live on the fringes in the bayou. The werewolves have fled. But still, Klaus isn't satisfied. He wants more. He wants power. But when Klaus finally finds a witch who will perform a spell to give him what he desires most, she secretly uses Klaus to unleash a curse--one that brings back hundreds of her ancestors--and begins a war to reclaim New Orleans. As the siblings fight off the attack, only one thing's for certain--the result will be a bloodbath.

"If you liked American Gods by Neil Gaiman or Circe by Madeline Miller, be sure to pick this one up." -- Timeworn

A sweeping tale of forbidden love and warring gods, where a young Inuit shaman and a Viking warrior become unwilling allies in a war that will determine the fate of the new world.

There is a very old story, rarely told, of a wolf that runs into the ocean and becomes a whale. . .

Born with the soul of a hunter and the spirit of the Wolf, Omat is destined to follow in her grandfather's footsteps-invoking the spirits of the land, sea, and sky to protect her people.

But the gods have stopped listening and Omat's family is starving. Desperate to save them, Omat journeys across the icy wastes, fighting for survival with every step. When she encounters Brandr, a wounded Viking warrior, they set in motion a conflict that could shatter her world. . .or save it.

1934. Businesses went under by the hundreds, debt and foreclosures boomed, and breadlines grew in many American cities.

In the midst of this misery, some folks explored unscrupulous ways to make money. Angel-faced John Partlow and carnival huckster Ginger LaFrance are among the worst of this lot. Joining together, they leave their small time confidence scams behind to attempt an elaborate kidnapping-for-ransom scheme in New Orleans.

In a different part of town, Curtis Mayhew, a young black man who works as a redcap for the Union Railroad Station, has a reputation for mending quarrels and misunderstandings among his friends. What those friends don't know is that Curtis has a special talent for listening...and he can sometimes hear things that aren't spoken aloud.

One day, Curtis Mayhew's special talent allows him to overhear a child's cry for help (THIS MAN IN THE CAR HE'S GOT A GUN), which draws him into the dangerous world of Partlow and LaFrance.

This gritty depression-era crime thriller is a complex tale enriched by powerfully observed social commentary and hints of the supernatural, and it represents Robert McCammon writing at the very top of his game.

"Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself." So begins Virginia Woolf's much-beloved fourth novel. First published in 1925, Mrs. Dalloway has long been viewed not only as Woolf's masterpiece, but as a pivotal work of literary modernism and one of the most significant and influential novels of the twentieth century. In this visually powerful annotated edition, acclaimed Oxford don and literary critic Merve Emre gives us an authoritative version of this landmark novel, supporting it with generous commentary that reveals Woolf's aesthetic and political ambitions--in Mrs. Dalloway and beyond--as never before.

Mrs. Dalloway famously takes place over the course of a single day in late June, its plot centering on the upper-class Londoner Clarissa Dalloway, who is preparing to throw a party that evening for the nation's elite. But the novel is complicated by Woolf's satire of the English social system, and by her groundbreaking representation of consciousness. The events of the novel flow through the minds and thoughts of Clarissa and her former lover Peter Walsh and others in their circle, but also through shopkeepers and servants, among others. Together Woolf's characters--each a jumble of memories and perceptions--create a broad portrait of a city and society transformed by the Great War in ways subtle but profound ways. No figure has been more directly shaped by the conflict than the disturbed veteran Septimus Smith, who is plagued by hallucinations of a friend who died in battle, and who becomes the unexpected second hinge of the novel, alongside Clarissa, even though--in one of Woolf's many radical decisions--the two never meet.

Emre's extensive introduction and annotations follow the evolution of Clarissa Dalloway--based on an apparently conventional but actually quite complex acquaintance of Woolf's--and Septimus Smith from earlier short stories and drafts of Mrs. Dalloway to their emergence into the distinctive forms devoted readers of the novel know so well. For Clarissa, Septimus, and her other creations, Woolf relied on the skill of "character reading," her technique for bridging the gap between life and fiction, reality and representation. As Emre writes, Woolf's "approach to representing character involved burrowing deep into the processes of consciousness, and, so submerged, illuminating the infinite variety of sensation and perception concealed therein. From these depths, she extracted an unlimited capacity for life." It is in Woolf's characters, fundamentally unknowable but fundamentally alive, that the enduring achievement of her art is most apparent.

For decades, Woolf's rapturous style and vision of individual consciousness have challenged and inspired readers, novelists, and scholars alike. The Annotated Mrs. Dalloway, featuring 150 illustrations, draws on decades of Woolf scholarship as well as countless primary sources, including Woolf's private diaries and notes on writing. The result is not only a transporting edition of Mrs. Dalloway, but an essential volume for Woolf devotees and an incomparable gift to all lovers of literature.

Note to readers: In the UK, this book is published under the title The Light Behind the Window. An aristocratic French family, a legendary château, and buried secrets with the power to destroy two generations torn between duty and desire.La Côte d'Azur, 1998: In the sun-dappled south of France, Emilie de la Martinières, the last of her gilded line, inherits her childhood home, a magnificent château and vineyard. With the property comes a mountain of debt--and almost as many questions... Paris, 1944: A bright, young British office clerk, Constance Carruthers, is sent undercover to Paris to be part of Churchill's Special Operations Executive during the climax of the Nazi occupation. Separated from her contacts in the Resistance, she soon stumbles into the heart of a prominent family who regularly entertain elite members of the German military even as they plot to liberate France. But in a city rife with collaborators and rebels, Constance's most difficult decision may be determining whom to trust with her heart. As Emilie discovers what really happened to her family during the war and finds a connection to Constance much closer than she suspects, the château itself may provide the clues that unlock the mysteries of her past, present, and future. Here is a dazzling novel of intrigue and passion from one of the world's most beloved storytellers.

"Imagine The Leftovers, but with honey" (Elle), and in the spirit of Station Eleven and Never Let Me Go, this "spectacular and deeply moving" (Lisa See, New York Times bestselling author) novel follows three generations of beekeepers from the past, present, and future, weaving a spellbinding story of their relationship to the bees--and to their children and one another--against the backdrop of an urgent, global crisis.England, 1852. William is a biologist and seed merchant, who sets out to build a new type of beehive--one that will give both him and his children honor and fame. United States, 2007. George is a beekeeper fighting an uphill battle against modern farming, but hopes that his son can be their salvation. China, 2098. Tao hand paints pollen onto the fruit trees now that the bees have long since disappeared. When Tao's young son is taken away by the authorities after a tragic accident, she sets out on a grueling journey to find out what happened to him. Haunting, illuminating, and deftly written, The History of Bees joins "the past, the present, and a terrifying future in a riveting story as complex as a honeycomb" (New York Times bestselling author Bryn Greenwood) that is just as much about the powerful bond between children and parents as it is about our very relationship to nature and humanity.