Can anyone recommend a good historical novel?

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Undave

Flockwit
So I've gone all the way through Cornwell's Sharpe, Arthurian, Saxon and ACW books. I've read Scarrow's offerings as well as Sidebottom's and numerous others so I'm all Romaned out. I've recently read Saul David's “Zulu Hart”, "Vlad: Last Confession" by C. C. Humphreys and Patrick Mercer's Crimean novel “To do and die” which were on offer in Asda.

What I fancy now is a good historical yarn based on the English Civil War but there doesn't seem to be much out there. I'm not particularly interested in anything set post 1900 so even though there's a mass of what I'm sure are really good WW2 epics I'm not bothered about them.

I need some books to put on my birthday list. Does anyone have any suggestions or recommendations?​
 
Sand Rat

Sand Rat

New member
Got no historical suggestions from the ECW. However, Steven Pressfield has some interesting pieces set in Ancient Greece, theres always Foresters Hornblower novels (and The African Queen if you want to go a bit past 1900), and the Aubry/Martin Novels.
 
doyme

doyme

New member
George MacDonald Fraser andthe flashman chronicles are pretty historically accurate (apart from some obvious alterations for plot reasons) and amusing. Portrays an anti-Sharpe character set in the mid to late nineteenth century.

For ECW... what about something by Walter Scott?
 
Wyrmypops

Wyrmypops

New member
I've enjoyed a few by Diana Norman. Barry Norman's missus. They're mostly set around the period where the US is emerging as a nation, or just has. That really only informs the background, the stpries are not neccesarily about those events. They're as much character driven as anything. Surprisingly enjoyable, with a female lead and author, coming to them after time spend with Bernard Cornwell was quite groovy.

If you've an interest in China, "Empress Orchid" by Anchee Min could be an option. The lead character is the last Empress, from her peasent beginnings, to a concubine competing with others in court, all the way to the end. Offered me perspectives I'd not have thought to think about.

For something a deal more raw blokey, could stretch the historical needs and go for some by the late, great David Gemmell. His last trilogy covered the events we're aware of surrounding Troy. With a lead character overlooked by the Odyssey, but presented in such a way as to provide an "in" to the story without riding roughshot over what we know. It's more "inspired by history" than a true historical story. And if David Gemmell is an author that hasn't yet been devoured then they could be an introduction to his style. Uplifting and satisfying as it is.

There's another series of historical fiction I'm after myself. I read a couple of them years ago, and the memory being what it is I can't recall who wrote them or even a title. Were set in or just after the crusades, in England, with a strong lead character bolstered by service out there and now back trying to live a good life, bring up a daughter without a mother, while hunting religious relics.

Edit: Walter Scott getting mentioned. Yeah, I'd echo that. His Ivanhoe, excellent. I'd should call it memorable, but since I forgot it... Doh!
 
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ScottRadom

Shogun of Saskatchewan
I like the Star Wars novels. What? It all happened. Just 'cause it was "Long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away..." doesn't make it not true!

I also like "Gates of Fire" by Pressfield (I think) hardly heavy reading and likely not too historical. Maybe some WWII autobiographical stuff? I liked "Soldat" by... gah... can't remember. INtersting read though. He was the actual man who had to type up the official surrender of Berlin general order. "Panzer Battles" by Von Melethin I liked too. BUt that one was a little more dry.
 
Tercha

Tercha

Member
The last "book" I got was 100 classic books on Nintendo DS loads of stuff there and with the DS it still works out a bargain
Louisa May Alcott - Little Women
Jane Austen - Emma
Jane Austen - Mansfield Park
Jane Austen - Persuasion
Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice
Jane Austen - Sense and Sensibility
Harriet Beecher Stowe - Uncle Tom’s Cabin
R.D. Blackmore - Lorna Doone
Anne Bronte - The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Charlotte Bronte - Jane Eyre
Charlotte Bronte - The Professor
Charlotte Bronte - Shirley
Charlotte Bronte - Villette
Emily Bronte - Wuthering Heights
John Bunyan - The Pilgrim’s Progress
Frances Burnett - Little Lord Fauntleroy
Frances Burnett - The Secret Garden
Lewis Carroll - Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
Lewis Carroll - Through the Looking-Glass
Wilkie Collins - The Moonstone
Wilkie Collins - The Woman in White
Carlo Collodi - The Adventures of Pinocchio
Arthur Conan Doyle - The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Arthur Conan Doyle - The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes
Joseph Conrad - Lord Jim
Susan Coolidge - What Katy Did
James Fenimore Cooper - Last of the Mohicans
Daniel Defoe - Robinson Crusoe
Charles Dickens - Barnaby Rudge
Charles Dickens - Bleak House
Charles Dickens - A Christmas Carol
Charles Dickens - David Copperfield
Charles Dickens - Dombey and Son
Charles Dickens - Great Expectations
Charles Dickens - Hard Times
Charles Dickens - Martin Chuzzlewit
Charles Dickens - Nicholas Nickleby
Charles Dickens - The Old Curiosity Shop
Charles Dickens - Oliver Twist
Charles Dickens - The Pickwick Papers
Charles Dickens - A Tale of Two Cities
Alexandre Dumas - The Count of Monte Cristo
Alexandre Dumas - The Three Musketeers
George Eliot - Adam Bede
George Eliot - Middlemarch
George Eliot - The Mill on the Floss
Henry Rider Haggard - King Solomon’s Mines
Thomas Hardy - Far From The Madding Crowd
Thomas Hardy - The Mayor of Casterbridge
Thomas Hardy - Tess of The D’Urbervilles
Thomas Hardy - Under the Greenwood Tree
Nathaniel Hawthorne - The Scarlet Letter
Victor Hugo - The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Victor Hugo - Les Miserables
Washington Irving - The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon
Charles Kingsley - Westward Ho!
D.H. Lawrence - Sons And Lovers
Gaston Leroux - The Phantom of the Opera
Jack London - The Call of the Wild
Jack London - White Fang
Herman Melville - Moby Dick
Edgar Allen Poe - Tales of Mystery and Imagination
Sir Walter Scott - Ivanhoe
Sir Walter Scott - Rob Roy
Sir Walter Scott - Waverley
Anna Sewell - Black Beauty
William Shakespeare - All’s Well That Ends Well
William Shakespeare - Antony and Cleopatra
William Shakespeare - As You Like It
William Shakespeare - The Comedy of Errors
William Shakespeare - Hamlet
William Shakespeare - Julius Caesar
William Shakespeare - King Henry the Fifth
William Shakespeare - King Lear
William Shakespeare - King Richard the Third
William Shakespeare - Love’s Labour’s Lost
William Shakespeare - Macbeth
William Shakespeare - The Merchant of Venice
William Shakespeare - A Midsummer-Night’s Dream
William Shakespeare - Much Ado About Nothing
William Shakespeare - Othello, the Moor of Venice
William Shakespeare - Romeo and Juliet
William Shakespeare - The Taming of the Shrew
William Shakespeare - The Tempest
William Shakespeare - Timon of Athens
William Shakespeare - Titus Andronicus
William Shakespeare - Twelfth Night
William Shakespeare - The Winter’s Tale
Robert Louis Stevenson- Kidnapped
Robert Louis Stevenson - The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Robert Louis Stevenson - Treasure Island
Jonathan Swift - Gulliver’s Travels
William Thackeray - Vanity Fair
Anthony Trollope - Barchester Towers
Mark Twain - Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Mark Twain - Adventures of Tom Sawyer
Jules Verne - Round the World in Eighty Days
Jules Verne - 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Oscar Wilde - The Importance of Being Earnest
Oscar Wilde - The Picture of Dorian Gray
Plus you can download more...
AND play games!
 
T

Torn blue sky

New member
YES! Fortunately for you I logged in by chance!
Theres a series by a guy called Conn Iggulden (sp) about Ghengis Khan. Historically accurate but written in a clever story narrative.I think it starts with a book called "Lords of the Bow". I'd thoroughly recommend it! The bits he left out he actually puts in a epilogue in the end, and also cleans up some facts. It actually gives you an incredible insight as to why this man rose up, and how. A lot of things I had no idea about which lead me, now, to believe. This man was some kina hero in his own right! Not only that, but a brilliant genius.
 
Einion

Einion

New member
The Young Montrose by Nigel Tranter (if you like this there's a sequel). Nicholas Carter wrote a series of novels from the 90s set in the ECW, first one's called Turncoat's Drum, I think there are six books in total. And if the era is of particular interest without the need to have action centre stage then As Meat Loves Salt by Maria McCann and Wife To Mr. Milton by Robert Graves might be worth hunting up.

Honorable mention: Michael Crichton actually has a novel set in about the same era called Pirate Latitudes.

Einion
 
doyme

doyme

New member
Forgot to say in my previous post that a classic (and quite historically accurate) book on Japanese history is Musashi by Eiji Yoshikawa. That was a great read.
 
freakinacage

freakinacage

Well-known member
pillars of the earth. pretty thick but a damn good read. and i don';t like books like that. would be an easy transition for someone into fantasy
 
W

War Griffon

New member
Torn blue sky said:
YES! Fortunately for you I logged in by chance!
Theres a series by a guy called Conn Iggulden (sp) about Ghengis Khan. Historically accurate but written in a clever story narrative.I think it starts with a book called "Lords of the Bow". I'd thoroughly recommend it! The bits he left out he actually puts in a epilogue in the end, and also cleans up some facts. It actually gives you an incredible insight as to why this man rose up, and how. A lot of things I had no idea about which lead me, now, to believe. This man was some kina hero in his own right! Not only that, but a brilliant genius.
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I will second that series, well worth picking up for a read also the Rome series by the same author is very good (about 4 or six books in all if I recall).

Also as a one off pick up a copy of a book called Gates of Fire about the Spartans at the gates of Thermapalay (spelling) very good read done in a third person perspective and a lot better than the film 300 version.
 
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woodenanteater

New member
I can only reinforce the suggestion of Gemmell's Troy series - its a *ahem* little *ahem* earlier than you're looking for, but is a brilliant piece of historical fiction. I believe its pretty much the last thing he wrote before he died, too.
 
Wyrmypops

Wyrmypops

New member
woodenanteater said:
I can only reinforce the suggestion of Gemmell's Troy series - its a *ahem* little *ahem* earlier than you're looking for, but is a brilliant piece of historical fiction. I believe its pretty much the last thing he wrote before he died, too.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it's the last thing he did. He died halfway through writing the third book. His wife had to finish it off alone.

If only Douglas Adams had such a like minded wife, we could have enjoyed the thrd Dirk Gently book he failed to finish. :(
 
Azouzoo

Azouzoo

New member
The Ramses novels by Christian Jacq were pretty good if memory serves me right. Starts with Ramses: The Son of Light - Volume I .
 
Fizl

Fizl

Secret Crocodile
Here be dragons is a good book set around the time of King Henry, and his sons Richard and John, and the welsh princes. There are also books like 'The other boleyn girl' if you want to go a little later

Shaz
 
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