Historical Fiction recommendations please?

[jacksonlambsregulardisorder]

Good morning all,

I love historical fiction and am looking for recommendations, please. I'm not particularly committed to any time period but would probably not choose Ancient (never been particularly interested) or Tudor (which I do like but have read much too much of recently!). My favourite authors are Mantell, Harris, Boyd etc. What have I missed that you recommend?

Many thanks in advance.

I adore the Sunne in Splendour - about Richard III and Nora Loft's House Trilogy.

I had a Wars of the Roses jag recently. Read two differing authors - Phillipa Gregory, and Conn Iggulden. For different aspects of the same period.

I am currently reading The Story Spinner by Barbara Erskine. It's a mix of Welsh folklore and Roman history with a bit of modern magic added!
Its an easy read not to heavy- the characters are based on historical figures, but very little is known about them or their time period. So the author had a lot of artistic freedom!

Philippa Gregory (she wrote The Other Boleyn Girl) has done a good series on "the cousins war" (War of the Roses) which I enjoyed. They are The White Queen, followed by The Red Queen, The Kingmaker's Daughter, The Lady of the Rivers and The White Princess. They cover the period from the death of Joan of Arc up to the birth and childhood of the future Henry VIII, and are very well-done. The BBC made a couple of mini-series based on the books.

Pillars of the Earth

Tudor adjacent 🤣 are the Ashes of London series, set in the aftermath of the Great Fire of London. Very enjoyable.

I’ve also enjoyed Vaseem Khan’s detective series Malabar House, set a year after partition in Bombay.

The Lymond Chronicles, Dorothy Dunnett?

It's Tudor period, but focused more outside of England (Scotland, France, the Mediterranean, Russia) so covers different territory.

The first one (Game of Kings) is the most difficult to get into, but once you are in it is quite a ride!

I have been reading Susanna Gregory recently. She has written two series of historical detective fiction, one set in mediaeval times and the other set during the Restoration period

The Instrumentalist is a fantastic book.

Lisa See is an author I've enjoyed, particularly The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane and The Island of the Sea Women. Both fab books.

That's the series I read! Then I read Conn Iggulden's series, to get more of a male perspective.

Sharon K Penman's trilogy about the very earliest Plantagents:

• When Christ and his Saints slept - Henry I death, Stephen usurping Empress Maud/Matilda throne and the anarchy
• Time and Chance - Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine from her divorce from Louis Capet and marriage to Henry when he was still Duke of Normandy
• Devil's Brood - continuation of Eleanor and Henry's relationship including rebellion and the War Without Love

I love these 3 books and re-read them fairly regularly. There are modern anachronisms that grate a teeny bit, but I don't think they detract from the story.

There are 2x more books in that series -Lionheart and A King's Ransom about Richard I ascension, Joanna's marriage to King of Sicily, but I find them less interesting. She also writes indirectly about these characters in her Justin de Quincy / Queen's Man series, which are at the Richard-is-great-John-is-not end of history.

Elizabeth Chadwick writes a lot set in this time period; Norman conquest onwards. There is a series directly and also more loosely connected with William Marshall, Isabel de Clare, the Bigod Earls of Norfolk and Henry IIs illegitimate son William and his mother Ida de Tosney

The Sharpe novels by Bernard Cornwell are good fun, as are the Master And Commander series by Patrick O'Brian. They are the Napoleonic wars from an Army and a Navy perspective.

Conn Iggulden has several series for different eras: Stormbird (War of the Roses) Wolf Of The Plain (Genghis Khan) and Gates Of Rome (Roman empire, obvs).

You've probably read the Shardlake and the Wolf Hall series, but worth mentioning even though they're Tudor just in case.

The Silence Of The Girls trilogy by Pat Barker is the Trojan War from the perspective of Breisis, Achilles's hostage/slave. Outstanding.

How far in history do you want to go to? Jean M. Auel's Earth's Children series
Are you willing to read history of other countries? Pachinko

Zoe Oldenburg The World is Not Enough* set in France traces the history of a marriage in a 12th century, one of the few books I've read more than twice. There is a sequel which I haven't got around to yet.

Maria McCann As Meat Loves Salt, set in the English Civil War

(*totally crap title btw, the French original is called Argile et Cendres - Clay and Ashes)

Watching for ideas

Just read The Essex Serpent (Sarah Perry) and The Marriage Portrait (Maggie O’Farrell) is excellent. All the Light We Cannot See (Anthony Doerr) is very good, WW2 era. Stacey Halls does lots of decent period-set novels, mostly Georgian/Victorian I think.

Pat Barker’s Regeneration trilogy if you haven’t read it already. And I know you said not Ancient but her books retelling the wars of Troy - Silence of the Girls, the Women of Troy and The Voyage Home - are fantastic.

If you’re open to ancient period I have other recommendations - the Wolf Den trilogy by Elodie Harper, Rosemary Sutcliff, Jennifer Saint, Mary Renault.

Kate Mosse, although personally I’m not a huge fan.

If you're not particularly interested in one particular time period, I enjoy Edward Rutherford's books. He writes multi-generational (set over centuries), intertwined stories, often around a particular place. A bit Ken Follet-y, but much less dense I find. I particularly liked Paris and Dublin.

Another vote for Pat Barker's Regeneration trilogy, set in the first world war.

Another vote for Sharon Penman. My favourites are her Welsh trilogy (Here Be Dragons, Falls The Shadow and The Reckoning), but they're all great.

Norah Lofts, .rosemary Sutcliffe, Phillippa Gregory, Bernard Cornwell, Giles Kristian.

There are some fantastic suggestions here. I've definitely been adding plenty to my Want to Read list on Goodreads. Thank you everyone!

Ambrose Parry's books set in 19th century Edinburgh are very good. Kate Foster writes novels based on real events.
Year of Wonder by Geraldine Brooks, based on Eyam (?) the plague village.

The Kingmaker series by Toby Clements is unbelievably good. War of the Roses period. I'm always surprised it doesn't come up more often on these threads.

It's fascinating how many Wars of the Roses recommendations there are. It was so dramatic and violent; it's amazing how little pick up there is in popular documentaries etc.

Warwick was, of course, the Kingmaker! Will read, thanks.

I know you said not Tudor, but I recommend The Shardlake Chronicles by C J Sansom Tudor set murder mysteries.
Hallie Rubenhold - her books both fiction and non fiction centre on women's lives in the eighteenth century.
The Poldark series by Winston Graham
For a lighter, more romantic mood, never forget Georgette Heyer
And, not everybody's cup of tea, but for genuine Victorian novels, the Barchester Chronicles or the Palliser series by Anthony Trollope.