Historical Fiction Classics

After eighteen years as a political prisoner in the Bastille, the ageing Doctor Manette is finally released and reunited with his daughter in England. There the lives of two very different men, Charles Darnay, an exiled French aristocrat, and Sydney Carton, a disreputable but brilliant English lawyer, become enmeshed through their love for Lucie Manette. From the tranquil roads of London, they are drawn against their will to the vengeful, bloodstained streets of Paris at the height of the Reign of Terror, and they soon fall under the lethal shadow of La Guillotine.

Born to an English father and a French mother, lieutenant Charles Saunders Hayden's career is damned by his "mixed" heritage. Assigned to the HMS Themis, an aging frigate under the command of a captain reviled by his crew for both his brutality towards his men and his cowardice in battle...

Just as Mr. Darcy finally decides to propose to the enticing Miss Elizabeth Bennet, she is summoned to Falmouth, to meet a relation she never knew she had. Thus, the ill-starred Hunsford proposal is avoided - but before he could even begin to understand his luck, adverse circumstances hasten to conspire against him, and Fitzwilliam Darcy is compelled to follow the woman he loves to the far reaches of Cornwall, into a world of deceit and peril, where few - if any - are what they seem to be...

Depuis l'enfance, Raymond de Faligny et Elfrida Norsten sont voisins et ils sont ennemis. La famille du Dr Norsten - le père d'Elfrida - aurait dépouillé les Faligny d'une superbe propriété... Raymond leur voue une haine tenace. En revanche, sa sœur Aurore a noué avec le docteur des liens amicaux qui pourraient même devenir tendres. Mais une nuit, Aurore est assassinée... Dans le meurtrier en fuite, Raymond a formellement reconnu Norsten.

Marcus, a Roman officer in Nero's army, risks his career, his family, and even his life when he falls in love with a Christian woman named Callina. In order to win Callina's love, Marcus must come to understand the true meaning of her religion, even as Rome sinks under the excesses of Nero and Christians are thrown to the lions. Quo Vadis brims with passion and life as it explores one of the turning points in history.

Like most gentiles in Nazi-occupied Paris, architect Lucien Bernard has little empathy for the Jews. So when a wealthy industrialist offers him a large sum of money to devise secret hiding places for Jews, Lucien struggles with the choice of risking his life for a cause he doesn't really believe...

Japan, after suffering from a massive irreparable disaster, cuts itself off from the world. Children are so weak they can barely stand or walk: the only people with any get-go are the elderly. Mumei lives with his grandfather Yoshiro, who worries about him constantly. They carry on a day-to-day...

What's Georgiana Darcy's story? Jane Austen tells us so little in Pride and Prejudice that we're left to wonder. How did the early loss of her parents shape Miss Darcy's character? And what about her near-disastrous affair with Mr. Wickham? Is that the true source of her shyness? She adores her brother and his new wife, Elizabeth, but will their guiding influence be enough to steer Georgiana clear of new trouble as she comes of age and falls in love again?

Walter Herries establishes himself in Keswick and constructs an imposing property overlooking Uldale, further encroaching upon the peaceful lives of Jennifer and the children. Adam resolves to pursue a career in London, much to his mother's displeasure. He meets the Chartist campaigner Caesar Kraft and lives with him and his daughter Margaret. On a visit to the capital, Elizabeth Herries chooses the opportunity to escape from her unhappy life but is finally pursued by John.

Named a Must-Read Book for Summer by the LA Times and a Most-Anticipated Book of 2025 by Lit Hub Library Journal Title to Watch The story acclaimed English author Penelope Fitzgerald never wrote, of her real-life journey to Mexico with her son in search of a much-needed inheritance, by...

There’s only one way for Professor George Edward Challenger to prove that dinosaurs still roam the earth. He invites skeptical journalist Edward Malone to accompany him and a group of adventurers to see the creatures with his own eyes. But when they arrive at the fantastic volcanic plateau in the Amazon where time stands still, their expedition quickly becomes one of survival. With its cliff-hanging escapes, rousing humor, and nailbiting suspense, The Lost World is a pioneering work of fantasy-adventure that paved the way for every thrill ride to follow.

Written in 1819 but set in 12th-century England, Ivanhoe is a tale of love struggling to survive against a violent backdrop of politics and war. Wilfred of Ivanhoe was thrown out of his father's home when he fell in love with his father Cedric's ward, Lady Rowena. Ivanhoe later returns from fighting in the Crusades and is wounded in a jousting tournament. A series of events follows, including the return of King Richard to England, resulting in Ivanhoe's reconciliation with Cedric and his marriage to Rowena.

This annotated edition of the classic Gothic novel, Frankenstein, by Mary Shelly includes an historical introduction, an overview, study of the themes present in the book, and a list of famous quotes.

After thirty-five years, the Three Musketeers - Athos, Aramis, and Porthos - join forces again. This time, it’s to rid France of corrupt King Louis XIV. True to their ingenuity, they plan to replace him with the mysterious prisoner in the barbaric iron mask now languishing in the Bastille. But their old comrade D’Artagnan, still in loyal service to the court, stands in their way. As the daring coup unfolds, literature’s legendary brotherhood is put to the test.

Il Romanzo italiano per eccellenza che avrà un'influenza decisiva nella unificazione linguistica dell'Italia. Un grandioso affresco storico dove vengono magistralmente delineate le nostre radici culturali, sociali e politiche. Renzo e Lucia, don Abbondio, padre Cristoforo, don Rodrigo, l'Innominato, l'Azzeccagarbugli, la monaca di Monza... personaggi che sono entrati a far parte della nostra cultura e dei nostri modi di dire.

Faith ultimately bursts into flame as Updike's major new novel, charting the lives of one family through four generations, shows readers an America whose dream of perfection is translated into an obsession with God and the Moving Picture. Paterson, New Jersey, 1910: When a Presbyterian minister...

The Cotswolds, 1924. At the Old Forge in the quiet village of Maybury-in-the-Marsh a cry of anguish rings out: lady of the house Amy Phelps has been discovered dead. But with all the windows and doors to her room locked from inside, how – and by whom – was she killed? Arbuthnot ‘Arbie’ Swift finds himself in the unlikely position of detective. The celebrated author of The Gentleman’s Guide to Ghost-Hunting is staying at the Old Forge to investigate a suspected spectre, but now the more pressing matter of Amy’s murder falls to him too.

Once the toast of good society in Victoria's England, the extraordinary conjurer Edward Moon no longer commands the respect that he did in earlier times. Still, each night he returns to the stage of his theater to amaze his devoted, albeit dwindling, audience, aided by his partner, the Somnambulist - a silent, hairless, hulking giant who, when stabbed, does not bleed. But these are strange, strange times in England, with the oddest of sorts prowling London's dank underbelly.

Sensual, rebellious Anna falls deeply and passionately in love with the handsome Count Vronsky. When she refuses to conduct the discreet affair that her cold, ambitious husband - and Russian high society - would condone, she is doomed. Set against the tragic love of Anna and Vronsky, the plight of the melancholy nobleman Konstantine Levin unfolds. In doubt about the meaning of life - a mirror of Tolstoy’s own spiritual crisis - Konstantine is haunted by thoughts of suicide.

From some accidents of love and weather we never quite recover. At the worst of the Prairie dust bowl of the 1930s, a young man appears out of a blizzard and forever alters the lives of two sisters. There is the beautiful, fastidious Lucinda, and the tricky and tenacious Norma Joyce, at first a...