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Historical Fiction October 2025 |
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| One of Us by Dan ChaonIn 1915, 13-year-old orphaned twins Bolt and Eleanor, who share a psychic connection, run away from a murderous man claiming to be their uncle. They end up with Mr. Jengling’s Emporium of Wonders, which includes a death-foretelling woman and a dog-faced boy. While Bolt settles in, Eleanor doesn’t, and they still have their “uncle” on their trail in this “mesmerizing and macabre historical adventure” (Booklist). For fans of: Amiee Gibbs’ The Carnivale of Curiosities. |
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Boleyn Traitor
by Philippa Gregory
The author of The Other Boleyn Girl returns to the court of Henry VIII with a novel about the high cost of loyalty, love and betrayal.
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The missing pages
by Alyson Richman
1912: Harry Widener, a promising and passionate book collector, boards the Titanic holding tight to a priceless volume he's just purchased in London. After catastrophe strikes the ship, Harry's last known words are that he must return to his cabin to retrieve his latest treasure. Neither the young man nor the book are ever seen again. Honoring her son's memory, Harry's mother builds the Harry Widener Memorial Library at Harvard to house his extensive book collection and ensure his legacy. Decades later,Violet Hutchins, a Harvard sophomore recovering from her own great loss, is working as a page at the Widener Library. When mysterious things begin happening at the library, Violet wonders if Harry Widener's ghost is trying to communicate with her, seeking Violet to uncover a long-buried secret that the ardent young Harry took with him to the grave.
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| The Secret Book Society by Madeline MartinIn 1895 London, wealthy widow Lady Duxbury handpicks three women to join a secret book club, where they not only discuss novels, but become friends who help each other in a world where a wife can be put in an asylum at the behest of her husband. Read-alikes: Joanna Miller’s The Eights; Helen Simonson’s The Hazelbourne Ladies Motorcycle and Flying Club. |
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| The Hounding by Xenobe PurvisIn 18th-century Oxfordshire, a ferryman claims he saw one of the Mansfield girls turn into a dog. Soon villagers blame the girl and her four sisters, aged between six and 19, for the terrible heat, failing crops, and the dead body at the edge of the Thames River. Menacing and atmospheric, this timely Gothic-tinged debut explores misogyny, herd mentality, and resentment. For fans of: Chris Bohjalian’s Hour of the Witch; Arthur Miller’s The Crucible. |
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| Buckeye by Patrick RyanOn Victory in Europe Day, 1945, while her husband is away in the Pacific, beautiful Margaret shares a celebratory kiss with married hardware store clerk Cal Jenkins, whose physical disability kept him from enlisting. This leads to a connection between their small-town Ohio families for decades, where their sons grow up together but take different paths in the Vietnam era. For fans of: Read with Jenna books; vivid, heartfelt novels about families and war. |
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The Wayfinder
by Adam Johnson
A grand historical novel about a girl from a remote Polynesian island who goes on an epic journey to the heart of the Tongan Empire, from the Pulitzer Prize- and National Book Award-winning author.
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Shadow Ticket
by Thomas Pynchon
Milwaukee 1932, private eye Hicks McTaggart searches for a Wisconsin cheese fortune heiress, but he's shanghaied onto a transoceanic liner to Hungary; before he finds her he will be entangled with Nazis, Soviet agents, British counterspies, swing musicians, practitioners of the paranormal and outlaw motorcyclists.
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Bog Queen
by Anna North
A monumental discovery sets off a clash of worlds, past and present, over the fate of the land that holds us.
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Christmas at the women's hotel : a Biedermeier story
by Daniel M. Lavery
The eccentric residents of the Biedermeier Hotel juggle odd jobs, personal dramas and a lingering jewel heist mystery, from a high-society escort service to a suspiciously high phone bill.
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House of Two Pharaohs
by Wilbur Smith
When a scribe is murdered in a sealed vault, Nomarc Piay turns to his mentor-mage, Taita, who must also confront a brilliant adversary plotting to rise as Egypt's Dark Pharaoh in the tenth novel of the series following The Quest.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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