Historical fiction

  • The cinder path : a novel /

    Creator

    Cookson, Catherine.

    Abstract

    The cinder path from the Northumberland farmhouse symbolised defeat for Charlie Macfell. People saw him as a born loser, who always got the dirty end of the stick. At the root of it were boyhood humiliations by his brutal father, but was that all there was to Charlie? Then an opportunity emerged for him to display his inner strengths and integrity and to give the lie to those who thought him of no account. 1993.

    Audience
    Not specified
  • Sophie's choice

    Creator

    Styron, William

    Abstract

    The time is 1947. Sophie, a Polish Catholic beauty who survived Auschwitz, has settled in America. Stingo, a 22 year-old aspiring writer from Virginia, is drawn to Sophie and Nathan--a madly romantic couple whose instability and flamboyance utterly capture his imagination. The deeper Stingo sinks into these people's lives, the more he learns that each harbors terrible secrets.

    Not specified
  • The bird artist

    Creator

    Norman, Howard A.

    Abstract

    The setting is the bleak coastline of Newfoundland and the protagonist is Fabian Bass, an artistic type who paints birds when he is not building boats. Forced by his parents to abandon the woman he loves in order to marry a cousin, he revenges himself by murdering his mother's lover.

    Not specified
  • A place of greater safety

    Creator

    Mantel, Hilary,

    Abstract

    An extraordinary, epic novel set during the French Revolution, winner of the Sunday Express Book of the Year Award. A spellbinding, epic novel which recounts the events between the fall of the Ancient Regime and the peak of the Terror, as seen through the eyes of the French Revolution's three protagonists.

    Audience
    Adult**
    Not specified
  • The bastard

    Creator

    Jakes, John

    Abstract

    This is the story of Philip Kent. The illegitimate son of a British nobleman who was denied his heritage, he embraces the ideals of the fledgling nation of America-and takes up arms against his father's homeland.

    Not specified
  • The memoirs of Mary Queen of Scots /

    Creator

    Erickson, Carolly,

    Abstract

    The courageous, spirited Mary Queen of Scots tells her own story--from her youth as a young girl married to the invalid young King of France to her short reign as Queen of Scotland and her tragic imprisonment by her ruthless, merciless cousin Queen Elizabeth.

    Audience
    Adult**
    Not specified
  • Castlereagh Rose

    Creator

    Napier, Ross.

    Abstract

    In the tradition of the great Castlereagh coaches came the greatest, the grandest, most luxurious passenger liner ever to grace the seas.On her maiden voyage from England to Australia she more than lived up to expectations. But disaster lurked in her wake and inevitably overtook her when two mortal enemies came face to face and forever bloodied her name.

    Not specified
  • March /

    Creator

    Brooks, Geraldine.

    Abstract

    From the author of the international bestseller "Year of Wonders" comes a powerful love story set against the catastrophe of the Civil War. From Louisa May Alcott's beloved classic "Little Women," Brooks has taken the character of the absent father, March, and adds adult resonance to portray the moral complexity of war and a marriage tested by the demands of extreme idealism.

    Not specified
  • Beyond the sunset /

    Creator

    Jacobs, Anna.

    Abstract

    In the untamed outback of Western Australia, the Blake sisters are together again despite what seemed like insurmountable odds. For Cassandra, reunited at last with the man she loves, the Swan River Colony is a refuge that seems like a miracle after her ordeals. Two of her sisters have fallen in love with their new way of life. But then a messenger arrives from faraway England and it is the fourth sister, Pandora, who jumps at the chance to make her way back to the Lancashire moors she misses so badly.

    Not specified
  • Farewell to Lancashire

    Creator

    Jacobs, Anna.

    Abstract

    Separated from all that she loves...Cassandra Blake has raised her three sisters. The girls are the pride of their impractical father Zachariah, and not in a hurry to marry. Then the American Civil War cuts off supplies of cotton to Lancashire and the mills fall silent. There is a stark choice: stay and risk starvation or begin again elsewhere. Then an old feud tears the family apart. Cassandra is kidnapped and her sisters are forced to sail with a group of desperate cotton lasses to the Swan River Colony.

    Not specified