Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner
This is the epic tale of Thomas Sutpen, who grows up as a dirt-poor boy in backwoods Appalachia and has his first glimpse of social hierarchy when his family moves to a plantation in Tidewater Virginia. One day he goes to the mansion's front door, carrying a message, and is told by a slave wearing the master's livery that he must go around to the back door. This experience has a searing effect on the boy's consciousness. From that moment forward, he sets in motion his grand design: to become, at any cost, a man of wealth and power.
Ahab's Wife: Or, The Star-Gazer by Sena Jeter Naslund
Ahab's Wife is a breathtaking, magnificent, and uplifting story of one woman's spiritual journey, informed by the spirit of the greatest American novel, but taking it beyond tragedy to redemptive triumph. Beautifully written, filled with humanity and wisdom, rich in historical detail, authentic and evocative, Melville's spirit informs every page of her tour de force.
Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
Grace Marks has been convicted for her involvement in the vicious murders of her employer, Thomas Kinnear, and Nancy Montgomery, his housekeeper and mistress. Some believe Grace is innocent; others think her evil or insane. Now serving a life sentence, Grace claims to have no memory of the murders. Dr. Simon Jordan, an up-and-coming expert in the burgeoning field of mental illness, is engaged by a group of reformers and spiritualists who seek a pardon for Grace. What will he find in attempting to unlock her memories?
The All-True Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton by Jane Smiley
Lidie is hard to scare. We see her at twenty, making a good marriage - to Thomas Newton, a steady, sweet-tempered Yankee who passes through her hometown on a dangerous mission. The novel races alongside them into the Kansas Territory, into the maelstrom of "Bloody Kansas," where slaveholding Missourians constantly and viciously clash with Free Staters.
Angel’s Den by Jamie Carie
In 1808, Emma, the daughter of a prominent St. Louis family, believes she has met and married her dream man. But she soon discovers that Eric Montclaire is not who she thought he was. Controlling and merciless, Eric insists that Emma join him in a westward expedition following the trail that Lewis and Clark had broken a few years earlier. When Emma meets cartographer Luke Bowen along the way, her life is already in turmoil.
Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner
Wallace Stegner's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel is a story of discovery -- personal, historical, and geographical. Confined to a wheelchair, retired historian Lyman Ward sets out to write his grandparents' remarkable story, chronicling their days spent carving civilization into the surface of America's western frontier. But his research reveals even more about his own life than he's willing to admit. What emerges is an enthralling portrait of four generations in the life of an American family.
Autumn Bridge by Takashi Matsuoka
In the year 1311, in the highest tower of Cloud of Sparrows Castle, a beautiful woman sits by the window, watching as enemies gather below and fires spread through the night. As she calmly awaits her fate, she begins to write, carefully setting down on a scroll the secret history of the Okumichi clan…of the gift of prophecy they share and the extraordinary destiny that awaits them.
The Betrayal of the Blood Lily by Lauren Willig
Miss Penelope Deveraux never imagined she’d be whisked off to India to give the scandal of her hasty marriage time to die down. As Lady Frederick Staines, Penelope plunges into the treacherous waters of the court of the Nizam of Hyderabad, where no one is quite what they seem --- even her own husband. In a strange country, where elaborate court dress masks even more elaborate intrigues and a dangerous spy called the Marigold leaves venomous cobras as his calling card, there is only one person Penelope can trust…
The Binding Chair: Or, A Visit from the Foot Emancipation Society by Kathryn Harrison
In poised and elegant prose, Kathryn Harrison weaves a stunning story of women, travel, and flight; of love, revenge, and fear; of the search for home and the need to escape it. Set in alluring Shanghai at the turn of the century, The Binding Chair intertwines the destinies of a Chinese woman determined to forget her past and a Western girl focused on the promises of the future.
Breath and Bones by Susann Cokal
When a second-rate painter named Albert Castle takes his eight-foot masterpiece and leaves his model behind, Famke sets out over the Atlantic, convinced that she is his muse. Susann Cokal blends pre-Raphaelite painting, American brothels, Utahan polygamists, a bit of cross-dressing, a dynamite-wielding labor movement, one California millionaire, and the invention of electircal sexual stimulation (as treatment for consumption) into a comic novel that gallops across the American West.
The Bride's House by Sandra Dallas
It’s 1880, and for unassuming seventeen-year-old Nealie Bent, the Bride’s House is a fairy tale come to life. It seems as if it is being built precisely for her and Will Spaulding, the man she is convinced she will marry. But life doesn’t go according to plan, and Nealie finds herself in the Bride’s House pregnant --- and married to another.
Cane River by Lalita Tademy
Tademy takes historical fact and mingles it with fiction to weave a vivid and dramatic account of what life was like for the four remarkable women who came before her. Beginning with Tademy's great-great-great-great grandmother Elisabeth, this is a family saga that sweeps from the early days of slavery through the Civil War into a pre-Civil Rights South-a unique and moving slice of America's past that will resonate with readers for generations to come.
Chang and Eng by Darin Strauss
In this stunning novel, Darin Strauss combines fiction with astonishing fact to tell the story of history’s most famous twins. Born in Siam in 1811, Chang and Eng Bunker were international celebrities before the age of twenty. Touring the world’s stages as a circus act, they settled in the American South just prior to the Civil War and lived for more than six decades never more than seven inches apart, attached at the chest by a small band of skin and cartilage.
Cloud of Sparrows by Takashi Matsuoka
It is the dawn of the New Year, 1861. After two centuries of isolation, Japan has been forced to open its doors to the West, igniting a clash of cultures and generations. And as foreign ships threaten to rain destruction on the Shogun’s castle in Edo, a small group of American missionaries has chosen this time to spread the word of their God. Among them, Emily Gibson, a woman seeking redemption from a tormented past, and Matthew Stark, a cold-eyed killer with one more death on his mind.
The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber
Meet Sugar, a nineteen-year-old prostitute in nineteenth-century London who yearns for escape to a better life. From the brothel of the terrifying Mrs. Castaway, she begins her ascent through society, meeting a host of lovable, maddening, unforgettable characters on the way. Her rise is overseen by assorted preening socialites, drunken journalists, untrustworthy servants, vile guttersnipes, and whores of all stripes and persuasions.
The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl
Boston, 1865. A series of murders, all of them inspired by scenes in Dante’s Inferno. Only an elite group of America’s first Dante scholars—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes, James Russell Lowell, and J. T. Fields—can solve the mystery. With the police baffled, more lives endangered, and Dante’s literary future at stake, the Dante Club must shed its sheltered literary existence and find the killer.et.
Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
An orphan of unknown heritage, Eliza is raised in the British colony of Valparaíso, Chile. Eliza's feelings for Joaquín, a young, penniless revolutionary, are all-consuming. When Joaquín leaves Eliza in hopes of striking it rich in California, she is determined to follow him there, risking every comfort and certainty she has ever known.
The Daughter's Walk by Jane Kirkpatrick
In 1896, Helga Estby and her daughter Clara walked from Washington State to New York City in the hope of raising $10,000 to save their farm from foreclosure. But that journey is only the beginning of their story, as the tragedies that follow their accomplishments are enough to separate Clara from her family for decades. Estranged and alone, it will take the power of faith and forgiveness for Clara to accept healing and to walk into a present joy and a hopeful future.
The Deception of the Emerald Ring by Lauren Willig
Eloise Kelly has gotten into quite a bit of trouble since she started spying on the Pink Carnation and the Black Tulip-two of the deadliest spies to saunter the streets of nineteenth-century England and France. Not only has she unearthed secrets that will rearrange history, she's dallied with Colin Selwick and sought out a romantic adventure all her own. Little does she know that she's about to uncover another fierce heroine running headlong into history.
Deep Creek by Dana Hand
Idaho Territory, June 1887. A small-town judge takes his young daughter fishing, and she catches a man. Another body surfaces, then another. The final toll: over 30 Chinese gold miners brutally murdered. Their San Francisco employer hires Idaho lawman Joe Vincent to solve the case.Soon he journeys up the wild Snake River with Lee Loi, an ambitious young company investigator, and Grace Sundown, a métis mountain guide with too many secrets.
The Desires of Her Heart: Texas Star of Destiny, Book 1 by Lyn Cote
In 1821, when circumstances make it impossible for her to remain in New Orleans, Dorritt and her family head west to join Stephen Austin's settlement and recoup their fortune in Texas. But as he and Dorritt's party begin a grueling trek across untamed Texas, the success of their journey is in grave doubt. Mexico has broken with the Spanish Crown, and armies from both countries—plus marauding Comanches—roam the pine forests and prairies. And one of the party is plotting destruction.
Dessa Rose by Sherley A. Williams
In 1829 in Kentucky, a pregnant black woman was sentenced to death, but her hanging was delayed until after the birth of her baby. In North Carolina in 1830, a white woman was reported to have given sanctuary to runaway slaves. This classic novel of courage and redemption asks the question: "What if these two women had met?"
The Dress Lodger by Sheri Holman
In Sunderland, England, a city quarantined by the cholera epidemic of 1831, Gustine, a defiant fifteen-year-old beauty, sells her body to feed her only love: a fragile baby boy. When she meets surgeon Henry Chive, Gustine begins working for him by securing cadavers for his ill-equipped anatomy school. It is a gruesome job that will soon threaten the very things she’s working so hard to protect.
The Edge of Light: At Home in Beldon Grove, Book 1 by Ann Shorey
It is the summer of 1838 in St. Lawrenceville, Missouri. When her beloved Samuel succumbs to cholera, Molly McGarvie is heartbroken but determined to take care of herself and her children. But when Samuel's unscrupulous brother takes over the family business and leaves Molly to fend for herself, she knows she must head out on her own.
The End of the 19th Century by Eric Larsen
Malcolm Reiner dedicates his life to the "study of the mysteries of space and time." In his "studies" he finds a sweep of time includes the history of West Tree, Minnesota; of the "Epoch of Walking"; and of his own "years of perfect seeing," the period when, living on a farm outside West Tree, he's able, with a poetic vividness rare in fiction, to sense and see what America once was.
English Passengers by Matthew Kneale
In 1857 Captain Illiam Quillian Kewley and his band of rum smugglers are forced to put their ship up for charter. The only takers are two eccentric Englishmen who want to embark for the other side of the globe. The Reverend Geoffrey Wilson believes the Garden of Eden was on the island of Tasmania. His traveling partner, Dr. Thomas Potter, unbeknownst to Wilson, is developing a sinister thesis about the races of men.
The Expeditions by Karl Iagnemma
The year is 1844. Sixteen-year-old runaway Elisha Stone is in Detroit, a hardscrabble frontier town on the edge of the civilized world. A canny survivor with the instincts of a born naturalist, Elisha signs on to an expedition into Michigan’s vast, uncharted Upper Peninsula.
Fire Along the Sky by Sara Donati
The year is 1812 and Hannah Bonner has returned to her family's mountain cabin in Paradise. But Nathaniel and Elizabeth Bonner can see that Hannah is not the same woman as when she left. For their daughter has come home without her husband and without her son...and with a story of loss and tragedy that she can't bear to tell. Little does Hannah realize that she is about to be called away to face her greatest challenge ever.
The Forest Lover by Susan Vreeland
It was Emily Carr (1871-1945) - not Georgia O'Keeffe or Frida Kahlo - who first blazed a path for women artists. Her boldly original landscapes are praised today for capturing an untamed British Columbia and its indigenous peoples just before industrialization would change them forever. Now Susan Vreeland brings to life this fiercely independent and underappreciated figure.
The Gifted by Ann H. Gabhart
By 1849, Jessamine Brady has been in the Shaker Village for half her life, but in spite of how she loves her sisters there, she struggles to conform to the strict rules. Instead she entertains dreams of the world outside. When Tristan Cooper seems to step out of those dreams to entice her into the forbidden realm beyond the Shaker Village, her life turns upside down.
Heart's Safe Passage: The Midwives, Book 2 by Laurie Alice Eakes
It's 1813 and all Phoebe Lee wants out of life is to practice midwifery in Loudon County, Virginia. When Belinda, her pregnant sister-in-law, presses Phoebe to accompany her onto a British privateer in order to cross the Atlantic and save her husband from an English prison, Phoebe tries to refuse, then finds herself kidnapped.
Hottentot Venus: A Novel by Barbara Chase-Riboud
It is Paris, 1815. An extraordinarily shaped South African girl known as the Hottentot Venus, dressed only in feathers and beads, swings from a crystal chandelier in the duchess of Berry’s ballroom. Below her, the audience shouts insults and pornographic obscenities. Among these spectators is the Baron George Cuvier, whose encounter with her will inspire a theory of race that will change European science forever.
Hunting Midnight by Richard Zimler
A bereft child, a freed African slave, and the rich history of Portugal’s secret Jews collide memorably in Richard Zimler’s mesmerizing novel--a dazzling work of historical fiction played out against a backdrop of war and chaos that unforgettably mines the mysteries of devotion, betrayal, guilt, and forgiveness.
Imposture: A Novel by Benjamin Markovits
Lord Byron was the greatest writer and most notorious, scandalous lover of his age—an irresistible attraction for a sheltered, bookish, and passionate young woman like Eliza Esmond. Eliza believes she's met Byron on the doorstep of his publisher, and that her dreams have come true when he arranges to meet her in secret. But what if the man she believes to be Byron is someone else?
An Inconvenient Wife by Megan Chance
An Inconvenient Wife is a rich blend of suspense, social history (America in the 1880s), and passion. This is a powerfully written page-turner about a woman's struggle to escape the confines of her time, class, and gender.
Island of Wings by Karin Altenberg
Everything lies ahead for Lizzie and Neil McKenzie when they arrive at the St. Kilda islands in July of 1830. As the two adjust to life at the edge of civilization, where the natives live in squalor and babies perish mysteriously, their marriage-and their sanity-are soon threatened.
The Linnet Bird: A Novel by Linda Holeman
In the claustrophobic, mannered world of British India, Linny Ingram seems the perfect society wife: pretty, gracious, subservient. But appearances can be deceptive. Linny Ingram was born Linny Gow, an orphan raised in the gray slums of Liverpool, and she is haunted by her past, and by the constant threat of discovery.
The Long Song by Andrea Levy
The child of a field slave on the Amity sugar plantation in Jamaica, July lives with her mother until Mrs. Caroline Mortimer, a recently transplanted English widow, decides to move her into the great house and rename her “Marguerite.” Together they live through the bloody Baptist War and the violent and chaotic end of slavery.
The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen by Syrie James
What if, hidden in an old attic chest, Jane Austen's memoirs were discovered after hundreds of years? What if those pages revealed the untold story of a life-changing love affair? That's the premise behind this spellbinding novel, which delves into the secrets of Jane Austen's life, giving us untold insights into her mind and heart.
Luncheon of the Boating Party by Susan Vreeland
With her richly textured novels, Susan Vreeland has offered pioneering portraits of artists' lives. Now, as she did in Girl in Hyacinth Blue, Vreeland once again focuses on a single painting, Auguste Renoir's instantly recognizable masterpiece Luncheon of the Boating Party. Narrated by Renoir and seven of the models, the novel illuminates the gusto, hedonism, and art of the era.
Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
From its sharply satiric opening sentence, Mansfield Park dealas with money and marriage, and how strongly they affect each other. Shy, fragile Fanny Price is the consummate "poor relation." Sent to live with her wealthy uncle Thomas, she clashes with his spoiled, selfish daughters and falls in love with his son.
The Masque of the Black Tulip by Lauren Willig
Modern-day student Eloise Kelly has achieved a great academic coup by unmasking the elusive spy, the Pink Carnation, who saved England from Napoleon. But now she has a million questions about the Carnation's deadly nemesis, the Black Tulip. And she's pretty sure that handsome Colin Selwick has the answers somewhere in his family's archives...
Moloka'i by Alan Brennert
Mr. Midshipman Hornblower by C. S. Forester
The year is 1793, the eve of the Napoleonic Wars, and Horatio Hornblower, a seventeen-year-old boy unschooled in seafaring and the ways of seamen, is ordered to board a French merchant ship and take command of crew and cargo for the glory of England. This novel is the first of the eleven swashbuckling Hornblower tales that are today regarded as classic adventure stories of the sea.
Mr. Wroe's Virgins by Jane Rogers
When God told Prophet John Wroe to comfort himself with seven virgins, his congregation gave him its daughters. So begins this provocative and immensely powerful novel, set in nineteenth-century England and based on actual events.
My Antonia by Willa Cather
Willa Cather's classic My Antonia is the story of the daughter of an immigrant family that sets out to farm the untamed prairie land of Nebraska in the late 19th century. Told to us from the perspective of Jim Burden, an orphan who comes to live at his grandparent's neighboring farm, this is an enduring American classic rich with the beautiful imagery of the midwestern plains.
Natives and Exotics by Jane Alison
In 1970, nine-year-old Alice is ravished by the beauty of Ecuador, a country her parents are helping to despoil. Forty years earlier, Alice's newlywed grandmother Violet confronts her country's past as she makes a home in the wilds of Australia. And before that, in early nineteenth-century Scotland, Violet's great-great-grandfather George flees to the Azores, unaware that he will have a hand in destroying the earthly paradise there..
The News from Paraguay: A Novel by Lily Tuck
The year is l854. In Paris, Francisco Solano -- the future dictator of Paraguay -- begins his courtship of the young, beautiful Irish courtesan Ella Lynch. Ella follows Franco to Asunción and reigns there as his mistress. Isolated and estranged in this new world, she embraces her lover's ill-fated imperial dream -- one fueled by a heedless arrogance that will devastate all of Paraguay.
One Last Look by Susanna Moore
After several wretched months at sea, Eleanor Oliphant arrives in Calcutta with her brother Henry and sister Harriet. It is 1836, and her beloved Henry has just been appointed England’s new Governor-General for India. Eleanor is to be his official hostess. Over the course of six years and a trek from Calcutta to Kabul and back, India manages to unsettle all of her “old, old ideas.”
The Oracle of Stamboul by Michael David Lukas
Ushered into the world by a mysterious pair of Tartar midwives late in the summer of 1877 in the town of Constanta on the Black Sea, Eleonora Cohen proves herself an extraordinarily gifted child—a prodigy—at a very young age. When she is eight years old, she stows away aboard a ship to the teeming and colorful imperial capital of Stamboul where a new life awaits her.
The Outsider by Ann H. Gabhart
For as long as she can remember, Gabrielle Hope has had the gift of knowing--visions that warn of things to come. When she and her mother joined the Pleasant Hill Shaker community in 1807, the community embraced her gift. But Gabrielle fears this gift; when one of these visions comes to pass, a chain of events is set in motion that will challenge Gabrielle's loyalty to the Shakers.
The Painted Kiss by Elizabeth Hickey
Vienna in 1886 was a city of elegant cafés and grand opera houses. It was there that twelve-year-old Emilie Flöge met the controversial libertine and painter Gustav Klimt. When Klimt is hired by Emilie's bourgeois father to give her some basic drawing lessons, he introduces her to a subculture of dissolute artists, wanton models, and decadent patrons that both terrifies and fascinates her.
Persuasion by Jane Austen
This superb novel, autumnal and mellow in tone, concerns the lives and loves of the Elliot family and their friends and relatives, in particular the thwarted romance between Anne Elliot---Austen's sweetest, most appealing heroine---and Captain Frederick Wentworth. This is a wonderful recreation of genteel life in the English countryside.
The Poe Shadow by Matthew Pearl
Baltimore, 1849. The public, the press, and even Edagar Allen Poe’s own family and friends accept the conclusion that Poe was a second-rate writer who met a disgraceful end as a drunkard. Everyone, in fact, seems to believe this except a young Baltimore lawyer named Quentin Clark, who puts his own career and reputation at risk in a passionate crusade to salvage Poe’s.
A Proper Pursuit by Lynn Austin
Violet schemed her way to Chicago to discover the mother she barely remembered. As for romance… with the help of her grandmother and three great aunts, that is coming along nicely as well --- perhaps too well. Each of her relatives, including her saintly grandmother, seems to have a separate agenda for her. In the course of a summer, Violet's world will open wide before her eyes.
The Queen of the Big Time by Adriana Trigiani
Nella, the middle daughter of five, aspires to a genteel life “in town,” far from the rigors of farm life. But Nella’s dreams shift when she meets Renato Lanzara, the son of a prominent family. Renato is a worldly, handsome, devil-may-care poet who has a way with words that makes him irresistible. But Nella is not alone in her pursuit: every girl in town seems to want Renato.
Remembering Babylon by David Malouf
In the mid-1840s a thirteen-year-old British cabin boy, Gemmy Fairley, is cast ashore in the far north of Australia and taken in by aborigines. Sixteen years later he moves back into the world of Europeans. His own identity in this new world is as unsettling to him as the knowledge he brings to others of the savage, the aboriginal.
Riven Rock by T.C. Boyle
It is the dawn of the twentieth century when the beautiful, budding feminist Katherine Dexter falls in love with Stanley McCormick, son of a millionaire inventor. Before the marriage is consummated, Stanley experiences a nervous breakdown and is diagnosed as a schizophrenic sex maniac. Locked up for the rest of his life at Riven Rock, the family's California mansion, his true salvation lies with Katherine.
River of Smoke by Amitav Ghosh
In Amitav Ghosh's SEA OF POPPIES, the Ibis began its treacherous journey across the Indian Ocean, bound for the cane fields of Mauritius with a cargo of indentured servants. Now, in RIVER OF SMOKE, the former slave ship flounders in the Bay of Bengal, caught in the midst of a deadly cyclone.
Sally Hemings by Barbara Chase-Riboud
Thomas Jefferson had a mistress for 38 years whom he loved and lived with until he died—the beautiful and elusive Sally Hemings. In this moving novel, Barbara Chase-Riboud re-creates one of America’s most powerful love stories and gives us a poignant, tragic, and unforgettable meditation on the history of race and sex in America.
Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh
At the heart of this vibrant saga is a vast ship, the Ibis. Her destiny is a tumultuous voyage across the Indian Ocean shortly before the outbreak of the Opium Wars in China. In a time of colonial upheaval, fate has thrown together a diverse cast of Indians and Westerners on board, from a bankrupt raja to a widowed tribeswoman, from a mulatto American freedman to a free-spirited French orphan.
The Secret Life of Emily Dickinson by Jerome Charyn
The novel, daringly written in first person, begins in the snow. It's 1848, and Emily Dickinson is a student at Mount Holyoke, with its mournful headmistress and strict, strict rules. Inspired by her letters and poetry, Charyn goes on to capture the occasionally comic, always fevered, ultimately tragic story of her life-from defiant Holyoke seminarian to dying recluse.
More books like the ones on this list »
Accidents of Providence by Stacia M. Brown
Even in her own time, Rachel Lockyer is hardly noticed by others: she is an unmarried woman who struggles to support herself, living on the margins of society, and she cannot easily be slotted into one of the few roles available to women. But the novel opens up her life to us allowing us to glimpse her inner self, her passions and her humanity. When she falls in love with William Walwyn (a real historical figure), she finds herself swept up in the tide of history and a victim of Puritanical laws.
Angel And Apostle by Deborah Noyes
At the end of Nathaniel Hawthorne's classic novel, The Scarlet Letter, we know that Pearl, the elf-child daughter of Hester Prynne, is somewhere in Europe, comfortable, well set, and a mother herself now. But it could not have been easy for to arrive at such a place when she begins life as the bastard child of a woman publicly humiliated, again and again, in an unrelentingly judgmental Puritan world. With a brilliant and authentic sense of that time and place, Deborah Noyes envisions the path Pearl takes to make herself whole and to carve her place in the New World.
As Meat Loves Salt by Maria McCann
In the seventeenth century, the English Revolution is under way. The nation, seething with religious and political discontent, has erupted into violence and terror. Jacob Cullen and his fellow soldiers dream of rebuilding their lives when the fighting is over. But the shattering events of war will overtake them.
The Coffee Trader by David Liss
Amsterdam, 1659: On the world's first commodities exchange, fortunes are won and lost in an instant. Miguel Lienzo, a sharp-witted trader in the city's close-knit community of Portuguese Jews, knows this only too well. Once among the city's most envied merchants, Miguel has suddenly lost everything. Now, impoverished and humiliated, living in his younger brother's canal-flooded basement, Miguel must find a way to restore his wealth and reputation.
Daughters of the Witching Hill by Mary Sharratt
Bess Southerns, an impoverished widow living in Pendle Forest, is haunted by visions and gains a reputation as a cunning woman. Drawing on the Catholic folk magic of her youth, Bess heals the sick and foretells the future. As she ages, she instructs her granddaughter, Alizon, in her craft. When a peddler suffers a stroke after exchanging harsh words with Alizon, a local magistrate, eager to make his name as a witch finder, plays neighbors and family members against one another until suspicion and paranoia reach frenzied heights.
The Devlin Diary by Christi Phillips
London, 1672. A vicious killer stalks the court of Charles II, inscribing the victims’ bodies with mysterious markings. Are the murders the random acts of a madman? Or the violent effects of a deeply hidden conspiracy? Cambridge, 2008. Teaching history at Trinity College is Claire Donovan’s dream come true --- until one of her colleagues is found dead on the banks of the River Cam. The only key to the professor’s unsolved murder is the 17th-century diary kept by his last research subject, Hannah Devlin, physician to the king’s mistress.
The Feast of Roses: A Novel by Indu Sundaresan
The love story of Emperor Jahangir and Mehrunnisa, begun in the critically praised debut novel The Twentieth Wife, continues in Indu Sundaresan's The Feast of Roses. This lush new novel tells the story behind one of the great tributes to romantic love and one of the seven wonders of the world -- the Taj Mahal.
Girl With a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier
History and fiction merge seamlessly in this luminous novel about artistic vision and sensual awakening. GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING tells the story of sixteen-year-old Griet, whose life is transformed by her brief encounter with genius...even as she herself is immortalized in canvas and oil.
The Glassblower of Murano by Marina Fiorato
Venice, 1681. Glassblowing is the lifeblood of the Republic, and Venetian mirrors are more precious than gold. Jealously guarded by the murderous Council of Ten, the glassblowers of Murano are virtually imprisoned on their island in the lagoon. But the greatest of the artists, Corradino Manin, sells his methods and his soul to the Sun King, Louis XIV of France, to protect his secret daughter.
The Heretic's Daughter by Kathleen Kent
Martha Carrier was one of the first women to be accused, tried and hanged as a witch in Salem, Massachusetts. Like her mother, young Sarah Carrier is bright and willful, openly challenging the small, brutal world in which they live. This is the story of Martha's courageous defiance and ultimate death, as told by the daughter who survived.
The Island of the Day Before by Umberto Eco
After a violent storm in the South Pacific in the year 1643, Roberto della Griva finds himself shipwrecked-on a ship. Swept from the Amaryllis, he has managed to pull himself aboard the Daphne, anchored in the bay of a beautiful island. The ship is fully provisioned, he discovers, but the crew is missing. As Roberto explores the different cabinets in the hold, he remembers chapters from his youth: Ferrante, his imaginary evil brother; the siege of Casale, that meaningless chess move in the Thirty Years' War in which he lost his father and his illusions; and the lessons given him on Reasons of State, fencing, the writing of love letters, and blasphemy.
Love and Louis XIV: The Women in the Life of the Sun King by Antonia Fraser
The self-proclaimed Sun King, Louis XIV ruled over the most glorious and extravagant court in seventeenth-century Europe. Now, Antonia Fraser goes behind the well-known tales of Louis’s accomplishments and follies, exploring in riveting detail his intimate relationships with women.
With consummate skill, Fraser explores the nature of women’s religious lives—as well as such practical matters as contraception—in her magnificent, sweeping portrait of the king, his court, and his ladies.
The Loves of Charles II: The Stuart Saga by Jean Plaidy
Ten years after Charles I was deposed and executed, his son, Charles II, regains the throne after many years in exile. Charles is determined not only to restore the monarchy but also to revive a society that has suffered under many years of Puritan rule, when everything from theater to Christmas festivals was illegal. As king, Charles II throws himself into the gaiety of court life, becoming a patron of the arts and a consummate lover of women.
Peony in Love: A Novel by Lisa See
Lisa See's haunting novel takes readers back to 17th century China, after the Manchus seize power and the Ming dynasty is crushed. Steeped in traditions and ritual, this story brings to life another time and place -- even the intricate realm of the afterworld, with its protocols, pathways, and stages of existence . . . a vividly imagined place where one’s soul is divided into three, ancestors are worshiped, misdeeds are punished, and hungry ghosts wander the earth.
Poison by Kathryn Harrison
Set in 17th-century Spain and narrated with hypnotic intensity, Poison is the story of two women, born on the same day, whose lives run a parallel, tragic course. The terror of Spain's Inquisition, the tyranny of superstition, the rapture of religious fervor and the intrigue of the king's court form the backdrop of this rich, mesmerizing novel.
The Secret of the Glass by Donna Russo Morin
The Murano glassmakers of Venice are celebrated and revered…but now three are dead, killed for attempting to leave the city that both prized their work and kept them prisoner. For in this, the 17th century, the secret of their craft must, by law, never leave Venetian shores. Yet there is someone who keeps the secret while defying tradition. She is Sophia Fiolario, and she, too, is a glassmaker. Her crime is being a woman…
More books like the ones on this list »
Editorial Content for The Orchardist
Book
Contributors
Reviewer (text)
In this exquisitely written story set in the Pacific Northwest as the 20th century begins, William Talmadge lives alone in a small cabin in the midst of his orchards of apples and apricots. He tends his fruit trees as he has for many decades, relying on intuition. He is used to his solitude, although he still yearningly remembers the sister who once was his companion before she mysteriously vanished into the forest. Talmadge enjoys the company of two good friends: a Native American man named Clee, who he's known since boyhood, and Caroline Middey, an herbalist. Read More
Teaser
At the turn of the 20th century, reclusive orchardist William Talmadge tends to apples and apricots as if they were loved ones. One day, two teenage girls appear and steal his fruit from the market; they later return to see the man who gave them no chase and end up indulging in his deep reservoir of compassion. But just as they begin to trust him, men arrive in the orchard with guns, leading to a shattering tragedy.
Promo
At the turn of the 20th century, reclusive orchardist William Talmadge tends to apples and apricots as if they were loved ones. One day, two teenage girls appear and steal his fruit from the market; they later return to see the man who gave them no chase and end up indulging in his deep reservoir of compassion. But just as they begin to trust him, men arrive in the orchard with guns, leading to a shattering tragedy.
About the Book
At the turn of the 20th century, in a rural stretch of the Pacific Northwest, a reclusive orchardist, William Talmadge, tends to apples and apricots as if they were loved ones. A gentle man, he's found solace in the sweetness of the fruit he grows and the quiet, beating heart of the land he cultivates. One day, two teenage girls appear and steal his fruit from the market; they later return to the outskirts of his orchard to see the man who gave them no chase. Feral, scared, and very pregnant, the girls take up on Talmadge's land and indulge in his deep reservoir of compassion. Just as the girls begin to trust him, men arrive in the orchard with guns, and the shattering tragedy that follows will set Talmadge on an irrevocable course not only to save and protect but also to reconcile the ghosts of his own troubled past.
Transcribing America as it once was before railways and roads connected its corners, Amanda Coplin weaves a tapestry of solitary souls who come together in the wake of unspeakable cruelty and misfortune. She writes with breathtaking precision and empathy, and in THE ORCHARDIST she crafts an astonishing debut novel about a man who disrupts the lonely harmony of an ordered life when he opens his heart and lets the world in.
Editorial content for The Vanishing Act
Book
Contributors
Reviewer (text)
On a small and snowy island, 12-year-old Minou lives with her father, a philosopher. Her only neighbors are a priest who is afraid of the dark and a magician who lives in a barn with a dog called No Name. Her mother disappeared a year ago, and while the other islanders know her to be dead, Minou does not believe it to be so. She spends her time contemplating God with the priest, magic with the magician, and Truth with her father, all the while awaiting her mother’s return. But when a dead boy washes up on the island’s shore and his body is brought to Minou&r Read More
Teaser
On a small snow-covered island lives 12-year-old Minou, her philosopher Papa, Boxman the magician, and a clever dog called No-Name. A year earlier, Minou's mother left the house wearing her best shoes and carrying a large black umbrella. She never returned. One morning, Minou finds a dead boy washed up on the beach. Her father decides to lay him in the room that once belonged to her mother. Can her mother’s disappearance be explained by the boy?
Promo
On a small snow-covered island lives 12-year-old Minou, her philosopher Papa, Boxman the magician, and a clever dog called No-Name. A year earlier, Minou's mother left the house wearing her best shoes and carrying a large black umbrella. She never returned. One morning, Minou finds a dead boy washed up on the beach. Her father decides to lay him in the room that once belonged to her mother. Can her mother’s disappearance be explained by the boy?
About the Book
On a small snow-covered island --- so tiny that it can’t be found on any map --- lives 12-year-old Minou, her philosopher Papa (a descendent of Descartes), Boxman the magician, and a clever dog called No-Name. A year earlier Minou’s mother left the house wearing her best shoes and carrying a large black umbrella. She never returned.
One morning Minou finds a dead boy washed up on the beach. Her father decides to lay him in the room that once belonged to her mother. Can her mother’s disappearance be explained by the boy? Will Boxman be able to help find her? Minou, unwilling to accept her mother’s death, attempts to find the truth through Descartes’ philosophy. Over the course of her investigation Minou will discover the truth about loss and love, a truth that THE VANISHING ACT conveys in a voice that is uniquely enchanting.
End of Your Life Book Club
Did you watch the Olympics or the political conventions? Please check as many as apply.
September 18, 2012, 0 voters
—
—
—
