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Historical Fiction July 2025 |
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| Blonde Dust by Tatiana de RosnayAt Reno, Nevada's legendary Mapes Hotel, young maid Pauline is assigned to Suite 614 and it changes her life. A single mom with little free time, it takes her a bit to realize the sweet, fragile woman in 614 is Marilyn Monroe, in town filming The Misfits as her marriage to Arthur Miller is dying. Serving up a moving look at the Hollywood icon, Blonde Dust is also an ode to female friendship. |
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Death at a Highland wedding
by Kelley Armstrong
Living as a Victorian-era housemaid after slipping 150 years into the past, modern-day detective Mallory Atkinson joins Dr. Duncan Gray at a Highland wedding-turned-murder in the fourth novel of the series following Disturbing the Dead.
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The four queens of crime : a mystery
by Rosanne Limoncelli
In 1938 London, Detective Chief Inspector Lilian Wyles enlists Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, and Margery Allingham to unravel the mystery of a baronet's murder during a high-society gala, navigating a web of suspects with personal and political motives
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| The Listeners by Maggie StiefvaterIn January 1942, war comes to West Virginia when the United States government orders the luxury Avalon Hotel to house Axis Power diplomats. Balancing work, worry, and ethical questions, hotel manager June Porter Hudson also gets to know a handsome FBI agent. This atmospheric adult fiction debut by a bestselling YA fantasy novelist has hints of magic and is a "must-read for all historical fiction fans" (Library Journal). Read-alike: Melanie Benjamin's Mistress of the Ritz. |
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The lost masterpiece
by Barbara A. Shapiro
"In a gripping novel full of plot twists, B. A. Shapiro embeds us in a circle of famous painters in late-nineteenth-century Paris, centering on the anguished Impressionist artist Berthe Morisot - the one woman in their midst who never got her due - and the story of Morisot's great-great-great-great granddaughter, Tamara Rubin, who has inherited Edouard Manet's Party on the Seine, a painting that completely upends her life. When Tamara inherits Party, she discovers a long-hidden family history replete with unanswered questions: How had it been stolen by the Nazis? How had the painting managed to survive three disasters that destroyed every other artwork around it? And most of all, why had she never known about her ancestor, Berthe Morisot? As the painting begins to metamorphose into darker and more terrifying versions of itself, Tamara's ordinary life is thrown into turmoil. What wounds and resentments plagued Morisot, and to what lengths will her spirit go for revenge?"
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The stolen life of Colette Marceau
by Kristin Harmel
As a descendant of Robin Hood, Colette Marceau takes her family legacy seriously. She's spent a lifetime stealing jewels from the undeserving rich and donating to people in need, including anonymously founding the Boston Center for Holocaust Education. Yet no number of good deeds can erase the guilt she feels over her younger sister's disappearance and death in Paris in 1942. When a bracelet linked to her sister resurfaces in a jewelry exhibition, Colette hopes to finally discover the identity of her sister's killer after 70 years. Teaming up to sleuth with both old friends and new, she soon wonders how different her life might have been had she made different choices all those years ago. The novel's twists and turns are fairly easy to predict, and those excited to read about jewel heists may be disappointed that Colette's thievery eventually takes a backseat to her search for answers
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The Story She Left Behind
by Patti Callahan Henry
In 1927, a famed author leaves her South Carolina home in the middle of the night. In 1952 London, Charles Jameson finds the author's papers and a letter addressed to Clara, the daughter she left behind. This soon leads Charles, Clara, and Clara's young daughter to the Lake District in search of answers. Try these next: Rhys Bowen's The Tuscan Child; Ann Hood's The Stolen Child.
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Where the Rivers Merge
by Mary Alice Monroe
Independent Eliza Rivers, who was born in South Carolina's Lowcountry in 1900, lives through wars, family turmoil, sexism, business growth, and more. At 88, she draws two young women close, sharing her past and hoping they can keep her beloved land safe from her selfish son in this multigenerational novel, the 1st in the Mayfield duology. Read-alikes: Dolen Perkins-Valdez's Happy Land.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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