Best of
Historical

1945

The Egyptian


Mika Waltari - 1945
    A 1940s #1 Bestseller and a Historic Novel All-Time Favorite A historic novel all-time favorite, after its translation in English from Swedish, The Egyptian topped the bestseller charts in 1949 and the years following. The protagonist of the novel is the fictional character Sinuhe, the royal physician, who tells the story in exile after Akhenaten's fall and death. Apart from incidents in Egypt, the novel charts Sinuhe's travels in then Egyptian-dominated Syria, in Mitanni, Babylon, Minoan Crete, Mitanni, and among the Hittites.The main character of the novel is named after a character in an ancient Egyptian text commonly known as The Story of Sinuhe. The original story dates to a time long before that of Akhenaten: texts are known from as early as the 12th Dynasty.Much concerned about the historical accuracy of his detailed description of ancient Egyptian life forced the author to carry out considerable research into the subject. The result has been praised not only by readers but also by Egyptologists.Waltari had long been interested in Akhenaten and wrote a play about him which was staged in Helsinki in 1938. World War II provided the final impulse for exploring the subject in a novel which, although depicting events that took place over 3,300 years ago

Ross Poldark


Winston Graham - 1945
    But instead, he discovers that his father has died, his home is overrun by livestock and drunken servants, and Elizabeth, having believed Ross dead, is now engaged to his cousin. Ross must start over, building a completely new path for his life, one that takes him in exciting and unexpected directions....Thus begins an intricately plotted story spanning loves, lives, and generations. The Poldark series is the masterwork of Winston Graham, who evoked the period and people like only he could, and created a world of rich and poor, loss and love, that listeners will not soon forget.

The Black Rose


Thomas B. Costain - 1945
    By stated by the author, this story "grows out of a legend, a most beguiling and romantic legened which is found in a very few old English histories"."Solid in its facts, colorful and romantic...a rich and remarkable historical tapestry." Quote from Christian Science Monitor".

Captain From Castile


Samuel Shellabarger - 1945
    "Torrid, nonstop adventure. . . . First-rate, " "Time Magazine."

The Ten Grandmothers: Epic of the Kiowas


Alice Marriott - 1945
    And when this book is original and, indeed, unique-when it achieves something that has never been done before-one's impulse is to rent a billboard, to hire a hall, in some way to underline and emphasize the excitement and enthusiasm of his discovery, so that other readers may share his pleasure."This has been my experience with The Ten Grandmothers, by Alice Marriott. It was the custom of certain tribes of Indians of the Great Plains to keep a 'winter count,' or calendar, of important events. Each year an officially designated scribe or historian of the tribe inscribed on a specially selected and prepared buffalo hide (which was a sacred tribal possession) a colored pictograph commemorating the most noteworthy event of the year-the happening or circumstance for which the year would be remembered in the oral literature and traditions of the tribe."Miss Marriott's book is based upon such a tribal history of the Kiowas, an important and tenacious nation of the southern Great Plains, for more than a hundred years. She has taken representative incidents from this story and built each into a unified narrative of personal experience, concrete and dramatic. The thirty-three narratives fall into four groups reflecting the major phases of Kiowa history in the last century; they are called, since Kiowa .economy was based on the buffalo, The Time When There Were Plenty of Buffalo; The Time When Buffalo Were Going; The Time When Buffalo Were Gone; and Modern Times. Since the same characters appear recurringly, the book has the effect of a loosely constructed novel."Miss Marriott is an ethnologist. Her book is based on eight years of work with the Kiowas–work that certainly consisted of much more than superficial interviews with aged Indians. There is evidence everywhere, not only of accurate scientific knowledge of the material to be presented, but of profound human insight and understanding."Miss Marriott is also a creative artist of extraordinary powers. Her book has abundant humor, drama and melodrama, beauty and sordidness, pathos and tragedy: all presented sharply, objectively, with economy, restraint, and dignity. The narrative of the long journey of Wooden Lance, to see for himself and for his tribe whether the leader of the Ghost Dance movement (that inspired the last desperate, irrational struggle of the plains Indians against the whites) had 'true power is unforgettable in its simplicity and reality. The story of the Kiowa girl Leah's return from her years at a boarding school in the East to her family on the reservation is as true and socially significant as it is poignant and dramatic."The great achievement of Miss Marriott's book is that it makes accessible to the reader of today the essence of a culture, a way of life and thought, now almost vanished from the earth."We have an uneasy feeling that some special meaning and value for Americans of today and tomorrow must lie in the older cultures of our continent which our own has so largely displaced. American writers from Longfellow on have tried with varying degrees of success to capture that meaning for us."Miss Marriott's book shows that our feeling was justified. No discerning reader will fail to find in the men and women who are so vivid in its pages-Sitting Bear and Eagle Plume, old Quanah and Spear Woman, and the Kiowa boys riding in their jeep to enlist for the present World War-in their vision and knowledge of life and their essential experience, abundant meaning for today."

I.W.W. Songs


The Industrial Workers of the World - 1945
    Songs of the Workers to Fan the Flames of Discontent Issued July, 1945 in Commemoration of the 40th Anniversary of the IWWHill, Joe, Ralph Chaplin, John Brill, John F Kendrick, GG Allen, James Connell, Eugene Pottier, JE Sinclair, Loren Roberts, Vera Moller, Pat Brennan, John E Nordquist, Richard Brazier, ES Nelson, William Whalen, T-Bone Slim, Walquist, Ethel Comer, E Nesbit, Gerald J Lively, WO Blee, Joe Foley, John Healy, Laura Payne Emerson, Covington Hall, Charles Ashleigh, Dublin Dan & An Unknown Proletarian (contributors)

Conceived in Liberty


Howard Fast - 1945
    Shortly after the soldiers establish quarters for the cold months ahead, disease begins to rip through the camp. The men, helpless against sickness and despair, are facing the longest winter of their lives—and their survival will determine the fate of their young nation. Passionate and unforgettable, Conceived in Liberty is one of Fast’s rawest accounts of the brutality of the Revolutionary War, and of the heroism of its soldiers. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

Behold Your King


Florence Marvyne Bauer - 1945
    It is the story of a young man who, at the cost of being renounced by family and friends, cannot deny his belief in the great teacher, Jesus of Nazareth.Jonathan of Cyrene was a handsome well-born youth who came to Jerusalem to live with his wealthy, childless uncle. This move promised a glowing future - he would probably become heir to his uncle's vast estates and, under his uncle's auspices, he would no doubt find a young woman, charming and beautiful, who would make the appropriate wife he longed for. It might all have happened had not Jonathan met the young Jewish teacher whose beliefs seemed so heretical to his uncle and friends. It was not long before Jonathan realized that he would never be happy unless he followed Jesus, for he knew He was the Messiah.