Historical Fiction Classics

The Greatcoats have found the heir to the throne...but now they must keep her alive, against all the odds. Falcio Val Mond has completed the final task given to him by the late King Paelis: he has found the King's Charoites (well, one at least). But his task isn't over, and now he, Kest and Brasti must protect the girl from those who want her dead.

Even as a young girl, Jill was a favorite of the magical, mysterious Wildfolk, who appeared to her from their invisible realm. Little did she know her extraordinary friends represented but a glimpse of a forgotten past and a fateful future. Four hundred years - and many lifetimes ago - one selfish young lord caused the death of two innocent lovers. Then and there he vowed never to rest until he'd righted that wrong - and laid the foundation for the lives of Jill and all those whom she would hold dear.

In the small 14th-century English village where he has lived his entire life, the boy has grown up with no name of his own, known only as "Asta's son". But when his mother dies, the boy receives both his rightful name, Crispin, and a lead cross, inscribed with a secret that soon has him fleeing for his life.

Losing no faithfulness to Bunyan’s original text, Christiana’s Journey: The Pilgrim’s Progress, Book Two follows the adventures of Christiana, her four boys, and a host of memorable characters who either help or hinder their progress on their journey to faith.

World War I has ended, and the five All-of-a-Kind girls are growing up! The oldest, Ella, is a young lady with dreams of singing and dancing in the theater. But she also thinks of Jules, who is returning from the war, so marriage is in the air, as well. Suddenly, however, Ella is discovered by a Broadway talent scout, and it seems that she will have her chance at a theatrical career after all. Will Ella choose Jules or vaudeville? Here is another charming tale of the warm, caring family that fans have loved for years!

Whistling Tor is a place of secrets: a mysterious, wooded hill housing the crumbling fortress belonging to Anluan - a chieftain whose name is spoken throughout the region in tones of revulsion and bitterness. A curse lies over Anluan's family and his people, and the woods themselves hold a perilous force whose every whisper threatens doom. Then the young scribe Caitrin appears in Anluan's garden, admiring the rare plant known as heart's blood. Retained to sort through entangled family documents, Caitrin brings about unexpected changes.

From the magical mysteries of India to the gaslit streets of Victorian London, Mercedes Lackey's unique departure from her Valdemar series follows a young woman doctor as she searches for the secret behind the sorcery in her blood.

The land outside of the Old City was supposed to be green, lush, hopeful. A place where Alice could finally rest, no longer the plaything of the Rabbit, the pawn of Cheshire, or the prey of the Jabberwocky. But the verdant fields are nothing but ash - and hope is nowhere to be found. Still, Alice and Hatcher are on a mission to find his daughter, a quest they will not forsake even as it takes them deep into the clutches of the mad White Queen and her goblin or into the realm of the twisted and cruel Black King. The pieces are set, and the game has already begun.

In this first of a planned five-volume set, David Roy provides a complete and annotated translation of the famous Chin P'ing Mei, an anonymous sixteenth-century Chinese novel that focuses on the domestic life of Hsi-men Ch'ing, a corrupt, upwardly mobile merchant in a provincial town, who maintains a harem of six wives and concubines. This work, known primarily for its erotic realism, is also a landmark in the development of the narrative art form - not only from a specifically Chinese perspective but in a world-historical context.

Cosimo di Rondo, a young Italian nobleman of the 18th century, rebels against his parents by climbing into the trees and remaining there for the rest of his life. He adapts efficiently to an existence in the forest canopy - he hunts, sows crops, plays games with earthbound friends, fights forest fires, solves engineering problems, and even manages to have love affairs. From his perch in the trees, Cosimo sees the Age of Enlightenment pass by and a new century dawn.

When first published in 1759, Candide became an instant best seller and is now regarded as one of the key texts of the Enlightenment. Voltaire’s preoccupations with evil and with various kinds of human folly and intolerance found a perfect vehicle in this philosophical tale. A master storyteller, he combined often wildly entertaining action with profoundly serious sense, parodying the traditional chivalric and oriental tales with which his public was more familiar.

God is a covenant making, covenant keeping God. From the dawn of prehistory, God’s dealings with mankind can be understood through the lens of covenant: A binding agreement of unending loyalty and faithfulness. His early covenants with mankind were one-sided, requiring very little from men in return. All of that changed with the birth of the nation of Israel, and her deliverance from slavery in Egypt through Moses. The Mosaic covenant, also known throughout the Bible as “the law”, encompassed the rest of the Old Testament books through the death and resurrection of Jesus.

A classic of faith, fortitude, and inspiration, this faithful New Testament tale combines the events of the life of Jesus with grand historical spectacle in the exciting story of Judah of the House of Hur, a man who finds extraordinary redemption for himself and his family. Judah Ben-Hur lives as a rich Jewish prince and merchant in Jerusalem at the beginning of the first century. His old friend, Messala, arrives as commanding officer of the Roman legions.

The story is told by a young 'unknown soldier' in the trenches of Flanders during the First World War. Through his eyes we see all the realities of war: under fire, on patrol, waiting in the trenches, at home on leave, and in hospitals and dressing stations. Although there are vividly described incidents which remain in the mind, there is no sense of adventure here, only the feeling of youth betrayed and a deceptively simple indictment of war—of any war—told for a whole generation of victims.

In 1931, a young woman writer living in Germany was inspired by Anita Loos's Gentlemen Prefer Blondes to describe pre-war Berlin and the age of cinematic glamour through the eyes of a woman. The resulting novel, The Artificial Silk Girl, became an acclaimed bestseller and a masterwork of German literature, in the tradition of Christopher Isherwood's Berlin Stories and Bertolt Brecht's Three Penny Opera. Like Isherwood and Brecht, Keun revealed the dark underside of Berlin's "golden twenties" with empathy and honesty.

After escaping from the dark and dismal workhouse where he was born, Oliver finds himself on the mean streets of Victorian-era London and is unwittingly recruited into a scabrous gang of scheming urchins. In this band of petty thieves, Oliver encounters the extraordinary and vibrant characters who have captured audiences' imaginations for more than 150 years.

Taken from the poverty of her parents' home in Portsmouth, Fanny Price is brought up with her rich cousins at Mansfield Park, acutely aware of her humble rank, and with her cousin Edmund Bertram as her sole ally. When her uncle Sir Thomas Birtram travels to Antigua, siblings Mary and Henry Crawford arrive in the neighbourhood, bringing with them the glamour of London life and a reckless taste for flirtation.

The course of true love never did run smooth.... When Fitzwilliam Darcy departs Hunsford after his disastrous proposal to Elizabeth Bennet, he does not expect their paths to cross again. Indeed, knowing the lady's true feelings for him, he makes every effort to see that they do not. But when a chance encounter leaves him stranded in an abandoned cottage with the one woman he can never have, Darcy quickly realizes there is more at risk than just Elizabeth's reputation.

Fitzwilliam Darcy is desperate. Finally confronted with a woman who ignites all his hopes, he agonizes over the cruel trick of fate which placed her in a situation beneath his notice. The morning after the Netherfield ball, he resolves to put as much distance between himself and her as possible.

Accidentally witnessing an encounter between the Baron de Charlus and the tailor Jupien, the narrator’s eyes are opened to a world hidden from him until now; he suspects that Albertine is attracted to her own sex.