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What's your favourite historical novel? Tell us and be in with a chance to WIN a SIGNED COPY of Helen Dunmore's new novel Exposure plus backlist book bundle

138 replies

UrsulaMumsnet · 01/02/2016 15:11

Set against a backdrop of the Cold War, spies and scandal, Helen Dunmore's remarkable new novel, Exposure, out this week, tells the story of a woman's determination to protect her family at all costs. When Lily's husband is accused of passing on highly sensitive information to the Soviets, and arrested, Lily is forced to confront forbidden love, intimate betrayal and the devastating power of exposure.

"Exposure is the sort of winter read you hanker for...the period is so meticulously re-created that you almost hear the hiss of the gas streetlamps." - The Times

"This book is a triumph - a marvellous piece of seamless storytelling." - Penelope Lively

Share your favourite historical novels for a chance to win a signed copy of Exposure, plus a backlist bundle of books including Sunday Times bestseller The Lie and The Betrayal.

Helen Dunmore is the author of fourteen novels. Her first, Zennor in Darkness, explored the events which led to D H Lawrence’s expulsion from Cornwall (on suspicion of spying) during the First World War. It won the McKitterick Prize. Her third novel, A Spell of Winter, won the inaugural Orange Prize, now the Bailey’s Prize for Women’s Fiction. Her bestselling novel The Siege, set during the Siege of Leningrad, was described by Antony Beevor as ‘a world-class novel’ and was shortlisted for the Whitbread Novel of the Year and the Orange Prize.

She is fascinated by the Cold War era, which was also the era of her childhood, and is the setting for Exposure, and by the secrets, betrayals, loves, lies and loyalties which make up the period’s intimate history.

What's your favourite historical novel? Tell us and be in with a chance to WIN a SIGNED COPY of Helen Dunmore's new novel Exposure plus backlist book bundle
What's your favourite historical novel? Tell us and be in with a chance to WIN a SIGNED COPY of Helen Dunmore's new novel Exposure plus backlist book bundle
What's your favourite historical novel? Tell us and be in with a chance to WIN a SIGNED COPY of Helen Dunmore's new novel Exposure plus backlist book bundle
OP posts:
nannyt · 01/02/2016 18:03

Loved Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier.

labradoodlemum · 01/02/2016 17:51

I loved Melting the Snow on Hester Street by Daisy Waugh

eddiemairswife · 01/02/2016 17:42

A Place of Greater Safety by Hilary Mantel. Following the lives of Danton, Desmoulins and Robespierre from their childhoods through to the French Revolution and its aftermath.....a period of history we don't study in detail in England. I lent it to a French friend, who was captivated by it.

pennwood · 01/02/2016 17:40

The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey is a book I enjoyed

cavylover · 01/02/2016 17:38

A Grove of Eagles by Winston Graham, author of the Poldark books. Excellently written book I would love to see turned into a film.

navylass · 01/02/2016 17:38

Definitely Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel for me.

lindarumsey · 01/02/2016 17:36

Should say The Cousins' War books!

LeighAO · 01/02/2016 17:35

Lots of choices but I think Kate Mosse writes brilliantly, sending her readers to a believable, vivid past, so my choices are Labrynth For a taste of Middle Ages Languedoc and The Taxidermists Daughter for a closer to home Sussex in 1912.

lindarumsey · 01/02/2016 17:34

The Cousins' War book by Philippa Gregory - great to read detailed history books from a female perspective!

Persistentdonor · 01/02/2016 17:32

"Katherine" by Anya Seton is one of my all time favourites. Sister-in-Law of Geoffrey Chaucer, and third wife of John of Gaunt; mother of the Beauforts. It is fascinating and evocative. One I have re-read many times over the last 45 years.

MrsRedWhite214 · 01/02/2016 17:22

I adore A Place Called Winter by Patrick Gale. I was completely swept away by it!

Clawdy · 01/02/2016 17:12

I loved We Speak No Treason by Rosemary Hawley Jarman. It turned me into a life-long Ricardian, and made the discovery of his bones in the car park many years later beyond thrilling!

Quogwinkle · 01/02/2016 15:59

I think it has to be Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel. I'm just about to start a reread of it this week. Close favourites also would have to be C J Sansom's Shardlake series and S J Parris's Giordano Bruno series.

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