Historical fiction genre books (1111)


761.

The Dew Breaker by Edwidge Danticat EN

0 Ratings
Description:
We meet him late in life: a quiet man, a good father and husband, a fixture in his Brooklyn neighborhood, a landlord and barber with a terrifying scar across his face. As the book unfolds, moving seamlessly between Haiti in the 1960s and New York City today, we enter the lives of those around him, and learn that he has also kept a vital, dangerous secret. Edwidge Danticat’s brilliant exploration of the “dew breaker”--or torturer--s an unforgettable story of love, remorse, and hope; of personal and political rebellions; and of the compromises we make to move beyond the most intimate brushes wit... continue

762.

The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years : A Novel by Shubnum Khan EN

Rating: 3 (1 vote)
Description:
“A dark and heady dream of a book” (Alix E. Harrow) about a ruined mansion by the sea, the djinn that haunts it, and a curious girl who unearths the tragedy that happened there a hundred years previous Akbar Manzil was once a grand estate off the coast of South Africa. Nearly a century later, it stands in ruins: an isolated boardinghouse for eclectic misfits, seeking solely to disappear into the mansion’s dark corridors. Except for Sana. Unlike the others, she is curious and questioning and finds herself irresistibly drawn to the history of the mansion: To the eerie and forgotten East Wing, ho... continue

763.

The Dogs and the Wolves by Irène Némirovsky EN

Rating: 5 (1 vote)
Country: Europe / Ukraine flag Ukraine
Description:
"This wonderful, panoramic novel goes right back to Ir ne Nemirovsky s roots, sweeping the reader from the Jewish quarter of a Ukrainian city in the early years of the twentieth century to Paris in the twenties and thirties, and back again to eastern Europe in a snowy winter on the eve of war. At its heart is a tragic love, between Ada from the poor Jewish quarter and Harry, son of a rich financier. The dogs are the comfortable, assimilated rich Jews up on the hill, while the wolves, their distant cousins, struggle below in the ghetto. Ada grows up motherless, looked after first by her father,... continue

764.

The Doll by Boleslaw Prus EN

Rating: 4 (1 vote)
Country: Europe / Poland flag Poland
Description:
Boleslaw Prus is often compared to Chekhov, and Prus’s masterpiece might be described as an intimate epic, a beautifully detailed, utterly absorbing exploration of life in late-nineteenth-century Warsaw, which is also a prophetic reckoning with some of the social forces—imperialism, nationalism, anti-Semitism among them—that would soon convulse Europe as never before. But The Doll is above all a brilliant novel of character, dramatizing conflicting ideas through the various convictions, ambitions, confusions, and frustrations of an extensive and varied cast. At the center of the book are three... continue


766.

The Dragon Can't Dance by Earl Lovelace EN

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Description:
In Trinidad the martial arts dancer, Aldrick Prospect, fights the commercialization of the Mardi Gras carnival. Sick to see the country's traditions destroyed-- warrior contests have been replaced by games for tourists-- he joins a coup d'etat, serves a stint in jail and never dances again.

767.

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett EN

Rating: 5 (1 vote)
Description:
Ann Patchett, the New York Times bestselling author of Commonwealth and State of Wonder, returns with her most powerful novel to date: a richly moving story that explores the indelible bond between two siblings, the house of their childhood, and a past that will not let them go. "'Do you think it's possible to ever see the past as it actually was?' I asked my sister. We were sitting in her car, parked in front of the Dutch House in the broad daylight of early summer." At the end of the Second World War, Cyril Conroy combines luck and a single canny investment to begin an enormous real estate e... continue

768.

The Eighth Life : (for Brilka) The International Bestseller by Nino Haratischvili EN

Rating: 4 (6 votes)
Country: Asia / Georgia flag Georgia
Description:
AN OBSERVER BOOK OF THE YEAR ‘That night Stasia took an oath, swearing to learn the recipe by heart and destroy the paper. And when she was lying in her bed again, recalling the taste with all her senses, she was sure that this secret recipe could heal wounds, avert catastrophes, and bring people happiness. But she was wrong.’ At the start of the twentieth century, on the edge of the Russian Empire, a family prospers. It owes its success to a delicious chocolate recipe, passed down the generations with great solemnity and caution. A caution which is justified: this is a recipe for ecstasy that... continue

769.

The Emperor's Tomb by Joseph Roth EN

Rating: 4 (1 vote)
Country: Europe / Ukraine flag Ukraine
Description:
The Emperor's Tomb is a nostalgic, haunting elegy for the end of youth and the last days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

770.

The Enchantress of Florence : A Novel by Salman Rushdie EN

0 Ratings
Country: Asia / India flag India
Description:
A tall, yellow-haired young European traveller calling himself 'Mogor dell'Amore', the Mughal of Love, arrives at the court of the real Grand Mughal, the Emperor Akbar, with a tale to tell that begins to obsess the whole imperial capital. The stranger claims to be the child of a lost Mughal princess, the youngest sister of Akbar's grandfather Babar: Qara K÷z, 'Lady Black Eyes', a great beauty believed to possess powers of enchantment and sorcery, who is taken captive first by an Uzbek warlord, then by the Shah of Persia, and finally becomes the lover of a certain Argalia, a Florentine soldier ... continue