Favorite Historical Fiction Authors

[Bonobo]

I really enjoy Gary Jennings' historical fiction (Aztec, Raptor. Journeyer)

Any reccomendations of other authors would be welcome.

[Yupster]

1. Harry Turtledove of course

Avtar, Fleetlord of the Race is one of the great literary haracters ever written about.

[catbert836]

14. I personally don't like him

His Videssos books based on the Byzantine/Persian/Turkish wars were pretty good, but I think he went downhill from there. His Worldwar and Colinization books are awful in my opinion, and The Great War and American Empire books, despite the intersting history, could have been written a lot better. His most recent series "Darkness" is just trash.

[Journeyman]

2. E.L. Doctorow, "Ragtime". . .

one of the finest pro-peace novels ever written. Totally unlike any historical fiction you've ever read but more meaningful to our present situation than you can imagine from a blend of fictional and fictionalized historical characters. Well worth the effort of explication.

On a more conventional level, I particularly enjoyed works of Irvine Stone when I was young (Passions of the Mind (Freud); Lust for Life (van Gogh); Agony and the Ecstasy (Michelangelo).

[OrwellwasRight]

52. Ditto Ragtime, and who wrote Pillars of the Earth? That was quality. nt

[rsdsharp]

68. Ken Follett wrote Pillars of the Earth nt.

[NeoGreen]

3. Does Patrick O'Brien count with his...

Aubrey/Maturin series of books?

Quite the excellent read.

[northernsoul]

26. LOVE Patrick O'Brien

I'm also a big fan of C.S. Forester's Hornblower series, though they are a bit more pulpy than the very literary O'Brien.

Over my winter break, I'm hoping to read more historic nautical adventure from the like of Dudley Pope, Dewey Lambdin, and Alexander Kent. Any other DUers familiar with their work?

[Billy Ruffian]

41. If you've read POB,

you may be disappointed with Pope, Lambdin, and esp. Kent.

Re-read POB. Much better (and I've read them all)

[Zero Gravitas]

34. 21

the Aubrey/Maturin books were simply brilliant. They recently published the the first three chapters of what would have been the 21st book, nothing too special (although they reproduce POB's hand written manuscript) but it was neat to read about Aubrey finally getting to "raise his flag".

[lenidog]

4. I have one

If you prefer the more non-fiction side or would want to try it. There is an author called Peter Tsouras he writes military history and is an analyst or was for the US Army. He is more of a what if author. He takes events and change them slightly then shows how if this had happened would have changed the course of history. The first book of his I read was called "Disaster at D Day" with a slight change in events he show how it could have changed victory into defeat. He also has edited some collections of stories/essays etc on various themes like that. It really show how small events in history can have repercussions that are earth moving.

[lenidog]

5. Robert Harris

Author of Fatherland, Enigma, Archangel and now Pompeii. His books range from historical fiction, what if or modern day thrillers that have their beginnings in the past. Excellent writer once I get started I can't put them down.

[wurzel]

6. Gore Vidal and Howard Zinn

[seg4527]

8. I second gore vidal

[non sociopath skin]

12. And I third him!

Re-read all the political novels in order last Summer. Wonderful stuff!

The Skin

[Mistwell]

7. Connie Willis

Doomsday book, and To Say Nothing of the Dog. Both involve time travelers returning to medieval society. The first is dark, the second is a comedy, and both are fantastic (and Hugo/Nebula award winners).

[hickman1937]

9. Georgette Heyer

She did an incredible amount of research on the regency period. Romance writers have been trying to imitate her ever since. The clothing, mannerisms, slang, everything. She was also great at creating real characters, and telling a great story. She ruined me for almost all other romances. I had to switch to SciFi.

[bobbieinok]

47. fabulous author

[Matilda]

57. I learned so much about Regency England from her books,

besides also falling in love with her heroes, and laughing out loud
at her funny secondary characters.

Just recently I said to my husband that somebody didn't have a
feather to fly with - he just looked at me with a strange look.
I have all the slang in my head, and I just forgot that not
everybody else does.

[indigobusiness]

10. Peter Forbath- The Last Hero. (Stanley's search for Livinstone in Africa)

Wm Harrison- Mtns of the Moon (Burton and Speke search for the source of the Nile)
---
Both books are extraordinary.

[yellowdogintexas]

11. Dorothy Dunnett, Jean Plaidy

[ogradda]

20. Jean Plaidy is awesome

Have you tried Cecilia Holland? I've never read Dorothy Dunnet but now I'll check her out. :)

[Dervill Crow]

61. Jean Plaidy

This is a familiar name from years ago. Does she also write as Victoria Holt?

[bobbieinok]

48. Dorothy Dunnett

Her series about Scotland and the 1500s

her book about MacBeth

her series about the European traders in the 1400s (?)

Her Scotland books and the MacBeth book sent me to the library to check the history

she also wrote a series of modern-day detective stories that are fun to read...

[raccoon]

66. THE Macbeth? The one of the three witches? What's the book title? nt

[yellowdogintexas]

79. King Hereafter nt

[catbert836]

13. Leon Uris

I loved "Mila 18", "Exodus" and "Topaz".

[hickman1937]

19. Did he write The Agony and the Ecstasy?

and QB7? I read them when I was 13 and loved them both. If it wasn't him, sorry

[JerseygirlCT]

36. Irving Stone, I thought.

Leon Uris did Trinity, and Mila 18 and Exodus and a bunch more -- all of them very good and very easily read.

[charlyvi]

39. Yes. Irving Stone wrote TAATE...

[hippywife]

46. I read all of those books, too

and enjoyed them but he writes from too biased an outlook for me.

[Kire]

15. Adam Braver

Adam Braver's debut novel, Mr. Lincoln's Wars, is a faithful execution of a bright idea. Thirteen stories with various narrators give us perspectives on Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War. We learn Mary Todd Lincoln's exhaustion and grief: "You're a pox, Abraham Lincoln, you bring tragedy to everything you touch. Kill all of the boys in this country, as well as your own." We hear from Zack Hargrove, the meanest, toughest Union soldier there was. We read an imaginary letter from a war widow to Mr. Lincoln, gloating over the death of her abusive husband. To all of these stories, Braver brings a boldly anachronistic writing style. His people speak contemporary language, and what's more, they feel contemporary (or at least post-Freudian) feelings. As Braver has it, the death of Lincoln's son defined and drove the President as much as the fight for abolition. The wildly violent Zack Hargrove had a dad who beat him, and John Wilkes Booth had father issues, too. Braver is determined to illuminate Lincoln's story with a new, more psychologically astute light. The result is carefully done and occasionally compelling, but in his efforts to expand our idea of Lincoln, Braver ends up with a strangely protracted, short-sighted view.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/006008118X/qid=1102801423/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/102-1649409-1076914?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

[terrya]

16. As an entertaining writer: Caleb Carr "The Alienist"

He had the historical facts right in his tale of a serial killer who killed young boy prostitutes (dressed as women) who worked in brothels in New York in 1896.

[indigobusiness]

17. That was a great read. The Angel of Darkness (follow-up)

was a little hard for me to get into, though. I didn't finished it.

[northernsoul]

77. Agreed, that was one helluva read

Too bad nothing else that Carr has done since has been up to the same level.

[robbedvoter]

18. Robert Graves - I Claudius; Maurice Druon - the Cursed Kings

And I pay homage to Alexandre Dumas who made me love the genre - especially his Queen Margot.
E.L Doctorow amazing as well.

[Dorian Gray]

22. Robert Graves is great.

I loved I, Claudius. I also love Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz.

For fun historical fiction, I like Philippa Gregory. The Other Boleyn Girl was a fun read. As were The Queen's Fool and The Virgin's Lover.

I also enjoyed Diana Gabaldon's Outlander.

I read a lot of historical fiction from various eras. Margaret George is good and thorough. The Ceasar series from Colleen McCullough I enjoyed. I really enjoyed The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant. I just finished The Good Earth, which I also enjoyed a lot.

(I realized after sending this that I really "enjoy" a lot of different authors. Sorry for the redundancy!)

[Matilda]

56. Maurice Druon, yes.

My mother bought all the Cursed Kings books one by one for me when
I was a teenager, and I loved them, and learned so much from them.
I still have every one in my bookcase.

I also love GEORGETTE HEYER - These Old Shades was my introduction,
but I've read and re-read them all over the years. Her knowledge
of Regency England must be unsurpassed, and she could be very
funny as well. Some of her later books were not quite as good as
the early ones though, the characters were a bit repetitive.

MARGARET IRWIN - Young Bess and The Proud Servant are my two
favorites, but all her books are enjoyable and interesting.

Early JEAN PLAIDY, but later on I think she was churning them out
too fast, and they were not as good as her early books

[Southpaw Bookworm]

21. Diana Gabaldon

Though some of her work crosses into fantasy, she researches her books to death. (Hence, why (A) they are soooo long, and (B) why there is such a space between them.)

[TheDebbieDee]

33. Yeah, she is good!

Her books are worth the info she gives about the properties of an assortment of herbs, alone.

[vixengrl]

23. Colleen McCollough--I loved her "Caesar" series.

I haven't read anything of hers besides the Caesar novels, but I absolutely loved them. Some of the things I particularly liked were the attention to detail and the obvious research (not that I'm a scholar or anything, but it didn't feel like she was glossing over things because she simply didn't know), and also how she fleshed out these historical figures like Sulla and Pompeius Magnus, so that I found their motivation ands characters very believable. I confess I found Gaius Julius himself a little idealized, and ditto the young Octavius, but on the whole, a great series. It encapsulates such a long period of time, you become acquainted with entire generations of Romans, and you may actually weep with their passing (Aemelius Scaurus and Livia Drusa caught me misty-eyed.) Even Cicero and Cato, although, I guess they'd be considered often antagonists, are wonderfully sympathetic, balanced. Her books actually turned me on to Livy, and Stephen Saylor, because I couldn't get enough Rome for awhile.

[WCGreen]

55. You could see the seeds of destruction had been sowed

and that it was only a matter of time...

What I really liked was how the perifrial charactors could have a whole lot of consequence turning round and round about them....

Lovely books, well written,,,,,,,

I do suppose, now that they are all done, to one ay sit down and read them end to end,,,,

[DemBones DemBones]

24. Andrea Barrett is a favorite of mine. About ten years ago, she

won the National Book Award for "Ship Fever and Other Stories." "Ship Fever" is a novella that takes up a good portion ot the book and is set in Canada, when Irish immigrants with "ship fever" were quarantined on an island. A doctor working on the island is a major character, and really existed. One of the short stories in the book features Linnaeus, another has a main character whose grandfather knew Mendel, etc. Like Barbara Kingsolver, Andrea Barrett was trained as a biologist and often brings biology and/or history of biology into her work, but Barrett generally sets her stories and books in the past.

Barrett's writing is beautiful but doesn't get in the way of her characters and plots.
Next, she wrote a fine novel, "Voyage of the Narwhal" about nineteenth century American naturalists, arctic exploration, abolitionists, love, etc. Most recently, she published "Servants of the Map," also good but I've only read it once.

I just read "Fingersmiths" by Sarah Waters, author of "Tipping the Velvet" and loved it. A fingersmith is a pickpocket in Victorian London and the novel deals with some very Victorian characters, including a woman who "farms" orphans and keeps the babies quiet with gin. It's a great, long read, with lots of surprises.

[Dorian Gray]

25. I liked Fingersmith

Sarah Waters is a great writer. I haven't read Tipping the Velvet yet, but I really loved Affinity. (Which I thought was her best book.)

[DemBones DemBones]

27. I saw the miniseries of "Tipping the Velvet" and it was

entertaining but this is the first time I've read any of her work. I'll try to get "Affinity" next.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

28. Time and Again by Jack Finney

This historical novel is based on the premise that a shadowy government agency has perfected time travel. It sends a young New York man of the 1970s back to the 1880s on a mission that even he doesn't know yet. In the meantime, he decides to solve a family mystery for his girlfriend.

While the plot is cleverly constructed, it's obvious that Finney spent months researching life in New York in the 19th century. One of the most enjoyable aspects of the novel is the main character's cultural shock at going back in time in his own city and his efforts to blend in without revealing his origin. I especially enjoyed the scene in which he first realizes that 19th century people were "in color."

The ending is a stunner.

I also enjoyed Gore Vidal's historical novels.

[iamjoy]

53. I Enjoyed Finney!

He wrote some a sequel too. If you liked the ending of "Time And Again" you'll like the beginning of "From Time To Time"

Now I'm going to have to check them out of the library so I can read them again!

[Dervill Crow]

62. Time and Again

Oh my, thank you! I read this years ago, actually the Reader's Digest condensed version, embarrassingly enough, and have wanted to re-read it but didn't remember the author or title.

[AgadorSparticus]

29. one of my childhood favorites was the white indian series

by donald clayton porter. i loved learning about the league of iraquois nation.

[Spider Jerusalem]

30. Herman Wouk...

"The Winds of War" and "War and Remembrance" were both excellent, I thought. Easily the best WWII historical fiction I can think of.

[TexasProgresive]

31. The first I read as a sixth grader

James Steet- wrote about the Dabney family starting in "Oh Promised Land" through the civil war and the Cuban peoples struggle to free themselves from Spain. The last was very sad as the Cubans were "liberated" by the US.

Ken Follet & Morgan LLewellen (probably butchered the spellings of their names.)

[Kazak]

32. Vonnegut, could you tell?

Slaughterhouse-5 would qualify as historical fiction, no?

[OnionPatch]

35. James Alexander Thom

Follow the River was one of my all time favorite books, ever. (It was actually based on a true story.) It was one of the most riveting books I've ever read. I stayed up all night because I could not put it down, literally, until I was finished. Children of First Man was also really good even though the title sounds like one of those cheesy series.

That said, I have read most of James Mitchener's books and enjoyed them all. (Learned a lot along the way too.) I really loved Alaska and Centennial. Oh, and Chesapeake.

[raccoon]

67. The Children of First Man kicks butt!

There's a theory that in 1100 and something, Prince Madoc of Wales and a group of his knights landed in Mobile Bay, Alabama. They never returned to Wales, but assimilated with the Mandan Indian tribe.

This book is the story of those Welshmen and their descendants. It's fairly believable, if you start on the assumption that Prince Madoc's trip really happened.

[Phillycat]

37. Oh! You must read Margaret George, then.

She's brilliant. She wrote books about Henry VIII, Cleopatra, and Mary Queen of Scots. She also wrote one about Mary Magdalene that I found much less interesting. But the other three are WONDERFUL.

[puddycat]

38. Margaret Atwood's novel Alias, Grace is a great read

based on a true story, its very well written.

[DixieBlue]

80. That is a great book. Have you read her take on Penelope?

It's a short book, but so good.

[roguevalley]

40. The author of the Sharpe's Rifles series. Wonderful series about

the Napoleanic Wars. I even own the DVDs. <Sean Bean as Sharpe> <Drool>
Damn. Can't remember the name. Wonderful books.

[MountainLaurel]

75. Bernard Cornwell

He has a series in progress right now about the Vikings.

[InvisibleBallots]

42. heh, my favorite historical fiction author

would probably be Thucydides :)

[indigobusiness]

43. Madison Smartt Bell

I've only read his other works, but this guy can really write. This trilogy is his venture into historical fiction, and he jumps in with both feet.

Master of the Crossroads
by Madison Smartt Bell

In 1995 Madison Smartt Bell published All Souls' Rising, earning both critical plaudits and a National Book Award nomination for this fictional account of Haiti's 18th-century slave rebellion. Now he continues the saga with Master of the Crossroads, the second volume of a projected trilogy. Even in his earlier narratives of contemporary America, the author has always been attuned to the byzantine politics of color. But by focusing on the figure of Toussaint Louverture--the black general who led the Haitians to independence only to be jailed for treason against the French Republic--Bell allows the politics of race to point him in unexpected and rewarding narrative directions. This is a big, muscular book, which derives much of its strength from the author's willingness to paint his tumultuous political and physical landscapes with broadly sweeping strokes. But it is also a work of surprising delicacy, whose finely drawn characters come to life with the minutest gesture or softly whispered word.
---------------

From Publishers Weekly
Bell manages the bravura feat of bringing coherence and novelistic focus to the intrinsically complex history of Haiti's national liberator in this second installment in his brutal, sweeping trilogy. The first volume, All Souls' Rising, a National Book Award finalist, took the slave revolt in Haiti up to 1793, when the great leader Toussaint Louverture was consolidating power. Continuing his stunning historical fresco, Bell traces the intricate weave of Toussaint's campaigns with an intelligence and verve reminiscent of Shelby Foote's classic military histories, braiding his rich character studies into the larger scheme. Racial classification was a science in Haiti in the 18th century, and the subtlest variations in skin color determined the treatment each person received. Riau, Toussaint's godson, is an ex-slave. For him, the desire of the white planters to reintroduce slavery, and their fundamental racism, is evident, but Riau's hatred doesn't vitiate his humanity. Riau does trust Toussaint's secretary, a white doctor, Antoine H bert. A subplot running like a silver thread in the shadow of the war is H bert's quest for his mulatto mistress, Nanon, after she runs away from H bert's plantation with Choufleur, a sadistic mulatto planter and Nanon's former lover, who exploits the psychodynamics of slavery in a frightening erotic context. The faltering planter aristocracy is represented by Michel Arnaud, who returns to the island although his house and lands were torched in the first phase of the revolt. Arnaud's past is one of murderous cruelty. Now, he is slowly rehabilitating himself, thanks to Claudine, his wife, who suffers from possession by the darkest Vodou spirit, Baron Samedi. Bell continually integrates his history with the sacred Vodou landscape, and as events channel between crossroads, trances, dreams and bloodshed, this mesmerizing, disturbing saga of a half-forgotten war takes on the ominous outlines and biblical proportions of a prophetic vision. (Oct.)

[Bridget Burke]

44. George MacDonald Fraser: The Flashman books.

These are the adventures of Harry Flashman--cad, bounder, lecher & coward. He adventured his way through the 19th Century--the Empire & beyond. Witty writing with a really solid historical background.

[hippywife]

45. James Mitchener--hands down!

Mitchener was one of the world's greatest historical fiction writers. He weaved so much reality and research into his novels you often find yourself wondering if it is fiction at all.

He also did something that I totally commend him for. He told both sides of a conflict so eloquently that you could relate to the emotions that drove them, their faults, foibles, and their attributes. His work really emphasizes the need for people to realize there are two sides to every story and somewhere in the middle lies the truth and the path to learning to live together in peace.

I've read nearly every one of his novels more than once, some more than twice.

[Dulcinea]

60. Mine too!

I started reading his books as a teenager. I loved, & still love, "Chesapeake," but I enjoyed the others too!

[DrZeeLit]

49. Sara Donati -- Wilderness series

I just finished the fourth book.
And then I wanted to find something about the next one, so I googled her and found her blog.
Oh my goodness -- she is sooooo one of us.
the stuff on her blog was AWESOME!

Now I love her work more than ever.

Into the Wilderness is the first book.

[saltpoint]

50. Mary Renault.

Her trilogy on the life of Alexander is wonderful.

The books are: FIRE FROM HEAVEN, THE PERSIAN BOY, and FUNERAL GAMES.

The triology covers Macedonia/Greece from the time just before Alexander's childhood all the way to the rise of Ptolemy in Egypt after his death.

[Matilda]

58. I also have two on the legend of Theseus:

THE KING MUST DIE and THE BULL FROM THE SEA.

They were my introduction to Mary Renault.

[Room101]

51. Gore Vidal ...

He has the ability to make the reader feel like a fly on the wall during history's most epoch moments.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

72. Read Gore Vidal's historical fiction in order, and you'll never

look at American history the same way again.

Start with Burr (Revolutionary War and early nineteenth century), then move on to Lincoln, 1876 (about a stolen presidential election!), Empire, Hollywood, and then the one that was written first but comes last chronologically, Washington DC.

[iamjoy]

54. John Jakes; Diana Gabaldon

I know they're in the mainstream fiction category, but their writing is good. Although, I must say I've become disappointed in Jakes' books lately, there seems to be a certain sameness to them. I loved his North And South series and enjoyed the Kent family chronicles.

As for Diana Gabaldon, she has written 5 long novels about a British woman who travels from the time just after WWII to mid-eighteenth century Scotland. Romance and adventure, as well as some interesting perspectives on life at that time.

[catbert836]

59. Ken Follet

Anything by him is good. He's one of a special breed of authors who can come up with an entirely different story every time. His historical fiction is mainly about World War 2, like Jackdaws, Hornet's Flight et al.

[saltpoint]

63. Can I throw in Mary Renault? Her trilogy on Alexander the Great

is about as good as it gets for me.

[JitterbugPerfume]

64. I loved Aztec

I read it every two or three years.

I just finished "The Japanese, people of the three treasures" by Robert Newman , in the 1960s. It explains the Japanese people , and their history as well as anything I have ever read on the subject

It was a gift from my dear oneighty

[flamingyouth]

69. I have never read Aztec but I want to.

I have a 12-hour flight to China coming up next month and I think that will be perfect. :)

[JitterbugPerfume]

70. You wont be disappointed! It is a fantastic book.

but you gotta tell us about this trip to China? wow

[raccoon]

65. Sharon Kay Penman's novels about medieval England and Wales

are great.

She's also written some medieval mysteries.

Lindsey Davis' Falco mysteries, set in ancient Rome, are among my favorites. Ditto Ellis Peters' Brother Cadfael mysteries (12th Century England) and Fiona Buckley's Ursula Blanchard mysteries (Elizabethan England).

[LeftishBrit]

71. Rosemary Sutcliff (technically a children's author, but really for everyone)

Cynthia Harnett (ditto)

Elizabeth Goudge: Towers in the Mist, especially as it's set in Oxford where I live.

[terrya]

73. Thomas Mallon

Ok...God help me for saying this, since he's a conservative..

But I am really enjoying his latest novel, "Fellow Travelers". He's also written "Henry and Clara", the two people who were with Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln at Ford's Theater and "Dewey Defeats Truman"

Good historical writer.

[SCDem]

74. Caleb Caar's book The Alienist was a good one

[ChazII]

76. Jean Plaidy

European and British history.

edited for typos.

[northernsoul]

78. Patrick O'Brien's nautical adventures

I also like CS Forester's "Hornblower" series, although they're a bit cheesy.

[PATRICK]

81. Dewey Lambkin's Alan Lewrie series

I found better than O'Brien. American naval officer writing about Napoleonic era British sea captain, roguish type. Very good nautical detail, great historical and local color. Naturally he has his hero a lot near the Americas. Old fashioned about his typewriter so understandably he is not very active on a web page.

Likes cats.