Historical Literary Fiction Saga

The Leung family leads a life of secluded luxury in Hong Kong. But in December 1941, the Empire of Japan invades the colony. The family is quickly dragged into a spiral of violence, repression, and starvation. To survive, they entomb themselves and their friends in the Leung mansion. But this is only a temporary reprieve, and the Leungs are forced to send their children away. The youngest boy, Chung-Man, escapes with some of his siblings, and together they travel deep into the countryside to avoid the Japanese invaders.

Chicago, 1944. Liz Stephens has little interest in attending a USO club dance with her friends Betty and Julia. She doesn't need a flirtation with a lonely serviceman when she's set to marry her childhood sweetheart. Yet something happens the moment Liz glimpses Morgan McClain. They share only a brief exchange - cut short by the soldier's evident interest in Betty - but Liz can't forget him. Thus, when Betty asks her to ghostwrite a letter to Morgan, stationed overseas, Liz reluctantly agrees.

Pearl Street, Liverpool, Christmas 1942. Despite the drama and tragedy of the War, the street’s spirit and friendship in adversity binds them together. Since her husband was injured, Eileen has worried about the growing distance between them. Lena Newton longs for a baby but with her husband posted in the Navy, it's looking unlikely. And Kitty has hidden away since she discovered her lover was married, too ashamed to return in disgrace with her baby.

Around the corner from the elegant townhouses on Albion Place is Britannia Mews, a squalid neighborhood where servants and coachmen live. In 1875, it's no place for a young girl of fine breeding, but independent-minded Adelaide Culver is fascinated by what goes on there. Years later, Adelaide shocks her family when she falls in love with an impoverished artist and moves into the mews. But violence shatters Adelaide's dreams. In a dangerous new world, she must fend for herself-until she meets a charismatic stranger and her life takes a turn she never expected.

This is destined to be remembered as one of the most-recognized first sentences in literature -- along with "Call me Ishmael." And Una Spenser, the transcendent hero at the center of Ahab's Wife may well become every bit as memorable as Ahab. Inspired by a brief passage, in Moby, Dick, Sena...

The frontier of the Commonwealth of Virginia, 1783. In the years since the first settlers arrived, looking to build new lives, the township of Grafton has flourished. Together, European immigrants, Native Americans, indentured servants, and former slaves have established a tight-knit community. As time passes and America becomes a nation, Grafton is swept up in the tumult of the outside world. The Cherokees are rounded up and driven west. The Civil War leaves a long shadow. Newcomers make their mark, fortunes are won and lost, and loyalties are tested in the march of history.

In this highly anticipated new novel, Irishman Jack McNultyis a "temporary gentleman" - an Irishman whose commission in the British army inWWII was never permanent. Sitting in his lodgings in Accra, Ghana, in 1957, he's writing the story of his life with desperate urgency. He cannot take one step further without examining all of the extraordinary events that he has seen. A lifetime of war and world travel - as a soldier in WWII, an engineer, a UN observer - has brought him to this point. But the memory that weighs heaviest on his heart is that of the beautiful Mai Kirwan and their tempestuous, heartbreaking marriage.

First published in 1963, James A. Michener’s gripping chronicle of the social and political landscape of Afghanistan is more relevant now than ever. Combining fact with riveting adventure and intrigue, Michener follows a military man tasked, in the years after World War II, with a dangerous...

As the Japanese begin their assault on Singapore, Sarah Fuller is forced to leave her parents and fiancé, Philip, behind. The long journey to England is fraught with danger, and Sarah and her sister Jane don’t even know if their great-aunt is alive, let alone waiting for them. They arrive in Cliffehaven, on the south coast of England, and here Sarah must find work to support them both. When the Women's Timber Corps takes over the local estate, Sarah enlists as a lumberjill.

As the old gods awaken and satrapies splinter, the Chromeria races to find its lost Prism, the only man who may be able to stop catastrophe. But Gavin Guile is enslaved on a pirate galley. Worse, Gavin no longer has the one thing that defined him - the ability to draft. Without the protection of his father, Kip Guile will have to face a master of shadows alone as his grandfather moves to choose a new Prism and put himself in power.

Flying instructor Ellie Simpson has grown up a tomboy. She's never had an interest in the latest fashions or finding a husband; her only passion is flying her beloved Tiger Moth. But when war is declared, she is no longer be able to do what she loves most - fly.

Augsburg, 1913. Die junge Marie tritt eine Anstellung als Küchenmagd in der imposanten Tuchvilla an, dem Wohnsitz der Industriellenfamilie Melzer. Während das Mädchen aus dem Waisenhaus seinen Platz unter den Dienstboten sucht, sehnt die Herrschaft die winterliche Ballsaison herbei, in der Katharina, die hübsche, jüngste Tochter der Melzers, in die Gesellschaft eingeführt wird. Nur Paul, der Erbe der Familie, hält sich dem Trubel fern und zieht sein Münchner Studentenleben vor - bis er Marie begegnet...

Edmund MacGregor will do anything to save Scotland from English rule - even kidnap Lady Amelia Bell for ransom. As the daughter of a duke and the chancellor's betrothed, she's the perfect pawn in this game. But from the moment he first lays eyes on his spirited captive, he can't resist stealing a kiss.

Set in the 14th century in Europe's most farflung outpost, a land of glittering fjords, blasting winds, sun-warmed meadows, and high, dark mountains, The Greenlanders is the story of one family - proud landowner Asgeir Gunnarsson; his daughter Margret, whose willful independence leads her into passionate adultery and exile; and his son Gunnar, whose quest for knowledge is at the compelling center of this unforgettable audiobook.

In 1902, a young girl watches her family's life destroyed by corrupt officials and inscrutable natives. In 1954, the wife of the American ambassador becomes trapped in the intrigue of a Cold War love affair. In 1983, an evangelical missionary discovers that the Good News may not be good news at all to the Mayan refugees she hopes to save. And in 1999, the mother of an adopted Mayan daughter embarks on a roots tour only to find that the history she seeks is not safely in the past.

"Die Heimkehr der Stellings" beginnt im Berlin der 1920er, wo Conrad, der Enkel von Thomas Stelling, seiner großen Liebe Laura, einer Gutsbesitzertochter begegnet. Die beiden heiraten, ziehen nach Hamburg und bekommen ein Kind. Tochter Isabella wächst wohlbehütet auf, bis der Zweite Weltkrieg und der Nationalsozialismus in Hamburg einziehen. Eindrücklich und berührend erzählt Christa Kanitz von der Euphorie der Nachkriegszeit und vom leidvollen Kriegsausbruch.

Known for her beauty and boldness, Abigail MacGregor must preserve herclan's dangerous secret: that her mother is the true heir to the English Crown. If the wrong people find out, it will mean war for her beloved Scotland. To keep peace, she embarks for London, unprepared for the treachery that awaits - especially from her wickedly handsome escort. He is the enemy, but his slow, sensuous kisses entice her beyond reason.

The Magnificent Ambersons chronicles the changing fortunes of three generations of an American dynasty. The family serves as a metaphor for the old society that crumbled after the Industrial Revolution, as a Midwestern town spreads and darkens into a city.

A "wild west" tale of two brothers who battle both the state and a mafia empire in 1920s Italy, from famed Italian author Andrea Camilleri. Raffadali, province of Agrigento, 1920s. The Sacco brothers are free men with strong ideas about socialism and the state. Their lives change radically one morning when their father, Luigi Sacco, receives an anonymous letter from the local Mafia demanding protection money and is the victim of a robbery attempt. Luigi tells the police of the extortion letters he received, but the police don't know what to do.

The Awakening Land trilogy traces the transformation of a middle-American landscape from wilderness to farmland to the site of modern industrial civilization, all in the lifetime of one character. The trilogy includes The Trees (1940), The Fields (1946), and The Town (1950) and follows the varied fortunes of Sayward Luckett and her family in southeastern Ohio. The Town tells how Sayward completes her mission and lives to see the transition of her family and her friends, American pioneers, from the ways of wilderness to the ways of civilization.