Best of
Historical-Fiction

1977

The Thorn Birds


Colleen McCullough - 1977
    It begins in the early part of the 20th century, when Paddy Cleary moves his wife, Fiona, and their seven children to Drogheda, the vast Australian sheep station owned by his autocratic and childless older sister; and it ends more than half a century later, when the only survivor of the third generation, the brilliant actress Justine O'Neill, sets a course of life and love halfway around the world from her roots.The central figures in this enthralling story are the indomitable Meggie, the only Cleary daughter, and the one man she truly loves, the stunningly handsome and ambitious priest Ralph de Bricassart. Ralph's course moves him a long way indeed, from a remote Outback parish to the halls of the Vatican; and Meggie's except for a brief and miserable marriage elsewhere, is fixed to the Drogheda that is part of her bones - but distance does not dim their feelings though it shapes their lives.Wonderful characters people this book; strong and gentle, Paddy, hiding a private memory; dutiful Fiona, holding back love because it once betrayed her, violent, tormented Frank, and the other hardworking Cleary sons who give the boundless lands of Drogheda the energy and devotion most men save for women; Meggie; Ralph; and Meggie's children, Justine and Dane. And the land itself; stark, relentless in its demands, brilliant in its flowering, prey to gigantic cycles of drought and flood, rich when nature is bountiful, surreal like no other place on earth.Alternate Cover Edition ISBN 0380018179 (ISBN13: 9780380018178)

The Lion at Sea


Max Hennessy - 1977
    Confident and strong willed, Kelly Maguire knew from a young age that he could accomplish great things. A constant and abiding love of the ocean would prove to be the making of him.When the call of war is heard in the early 1910s, Kelly knows that he must answer it. Enlisting in the Royal Navy, he hopes to win both the war and personal glory. But from the barbarous battles of Gallipoli to the nightmarish action at Antwerp, Kelly, along with his young shipmates, begins to learn the trials a sailor must face, trials that will forge him from a boy into a man. As the epic battle of Jutland approaches, everything is at stake.A gritty adventure full of danger, blood and guts, perfect for fans of David McDine, Alan Evans and Alexander Fullerton.

The Immigrants


Howard Fast - 1977
     Dan Lavette, the son of an Italian fisherman, battles from the rubble of the San Francisco earthquake to build a fortune in the shipping industry. Rising to success through hard work and a loveless marriage to the daughter of the city's wealthiest family, he risks it all for the exotic beauty of a woman who shares his secret and scandalous passion. From Nob Hill to the harbor, San Francisco comes alive through three immigrant families -- Italian, Irish, and Chinese -- whose intertwining dreams are propelled by the emotional events of America's coming of age...

Child of the Morning


Pauline Gedge - 1977
    Yet her name--Hatshepsut--does not appear in dynastic scrolls, nor is her reign celebrated on monuments. This is the story of the young woman who assumed the throne of Egypt, mastered the arts of war and government, lived her life by her own design, and ruled an empire--the only woman Pharaoh in history.

Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes


Eleanor Coerr - 1977
    And then the dizzy spells start. Soon gravely ill with leukemia, the "atom bomb disease," Sadako faces her future with spirit and bravery. Recalling a Japanese legend, Sadako sets to work folding paper cranes. For the legend holds that if a sick person folds one thousand cranes, the gods will grant her wish and make her healthy again. Based on a true story, Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes celebrates the extraordinary courage that made one young woman a heroine in Japan.

These Old Shades / Sprig Muslin / Sylvester / The Corinthian / The Convenient Marriage


Georgette Heyer - 1977
    Hilarious comedy, fast moving drama, romance spiced with wit and charm - Miss Heyer combines all this with the period conversation and manners she knows to perfection.These five books will give hours of entertainment and lasting pleasure.

Merlin's Keep


Madeleine Brent - 1977
    AND A PAST SHE NEVER KNEW.From far-off Tibet to England's rich countryside, this marvelously enchanting novel unfolds the incredible saga of a beautiful, young half-caste whose strange destiny pulls her into a world of love and terror--a worlds a mysterious power moves slowly toward her, threatening her sanity...and her life.

The Rich Are Different


Susan Howatch - 1977
    But she didn't care. She was a very ambitious and beautiful woman with her eye on Van Zale's tremendous fortune. However, she hadn't counted on falling in love. Paul found himself attracted to Dinah in a way he had long forgotten. Her vitality, her sensuality, consumed him. With her he could forget his past, his wife, his enemies, his empire....

Maria


Eugenia Price - 1977
    A woman who battles fiercely for survival and her own independence, but surrenders completely to the man she loves.This is Eugenia Price's inspiring story of a unique American heroine-a woman whose strength and resourcefulness overcome every obstacle to survival in an untamed and turbulent lands. Maria is a true pioneer, valiant, hard-working, independent. But she is also a vibrant, flesh-and-blood woman, tempestuous in passion, steadfast in love.

The Girl


Catherine Cookson - 1977
    But, as the waif grew to beautiful womanhood, she became an object of desire to the local young men, and even to her half-brother.Against her wishes, she was married off to a gross, sensual man, but Hannah kept on fighting for the man she wanted: Ned Ridley, who adored her and taught her the meaning of true love and passion...

Ghost Fox


James A. Houston - 1977
    Seventeen-year-old Sarah Wells is taken from a New Hampshire farm by Abnaki Indians and renamed "Ghost Fox." Line drawings by the Author.

The Public Burning


Robert Coover - 1977
    The first major work of contemporary fiction ever to use living historical figures as characters, the novel reimagines the three fateful days in 1953 that culminated with the execution of alleged atomic spies Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Vice-President Richard Nixon - the voraciously ambitious bad boy of the Eisenhower regime - is the dominant narrator in an enormous cast that includes Betty Crocker, Joe McCarthy, the Marx Brothers, Walter Winchell, Uncle Sam, his adversary The Phantom, and Time magazine incarnated as the National Poet Laureate. All of these and thousands more converge in Times Square for the carnivalesque auto-da-fe at which the Rosenbergs are put to death. And not a person present escapes implication in Cold War America's ruthless "public burning."

The Ginger Tree


Oswald Wynd - 1977
    But soon after her arrival, Mary falls into an adulterous affair with a young Japanese nobleman, scandalizing the British community. Casting her out of the European community, her compatriots tear her away from her small daughter. A woman abandoned and alone, Mary learns to survive over forty tumultuous years in Asia, including two world wars and the cataclysmic Tokyo earthquake of 1923.A bestseller in England, this bittersweet story of love and betrayal in the Far East is the source of the Masterpiece Theatre miniseries.

The 33 Brand


Frank Roderus - 1977
    And one of the fastest pistoleros around. Tiny knew Keyes was a killer, and fast as a rattler, and Tiny, at 280 pounds made an easy target. Men thought him fat... but they were wrong, he was tough as a tree trunk. And a shotgun made up for being fast, if it was cocked and aimed.

Phoebe the Spy


Judith Berry Griffin - 1977
    Phoebe gets a job as George Washington's housekeeper, but her real job is to work as a spy. She listens and watches very carefully, and she meets her father every day to tell him what she has learned. One day Phoebe's father tells her that Washington is planning to leave town in a few days, and the person plotting against him will act before then. Phoebe is very frightened, but she is determined to figure out who is after Washington before it's too late. . . . "This episode drawn from the Revolutionary War is related with historical accuracy and suspense and illustrated with finesse."(School Library Journal)

Sally Hemings


Barbara Chase-Riboud - 1977
    Visited by a census-taker in 1831, 60-year-old Sally is encouraged to recount her past.

Gildenford


Valerie Anand - 1977
    Told from the perspective of a Saxon peasant, this is a story about the ruling family of England and the changing succession during the early 11th century prior to William the Conqueror taking the throne in 1066 from the Earl of Wessex.

The Sword & the Swan


Roberta Gellis - 1977
    Face-to-face with an oncoming army, he could decide matters of life and death. But now, face-to-face with one gentle woman, he was hopelessly confused and uncertain. Startled by Catherin's pale beauty when he first saw her, he was dumbfounded by her passionate radiance now, and he felt a desire far different from his usual impersonal need for a woman.

Blood Feud


Rosemary Sutcliff - 1977
    Sold into slavery to the Northmen in the tenth century, a young Englishman becomes involved in a blood feud which leads him to Constantinople and a totally different way of life.

The Tinfish Run


Ronald Bassett - 1977
    A convoy of merchantmen with its naval escort ploughs through the Arctic seas towards northern Russia.In the grey seas beneath them lurk the deadly U-boat packs and in the skies above, cloud hides the squadrons of dive-bombing Stukas.Aboard V&W class destroyer Virtue, Ordinary Seaman ‘Lobby’ Ludd is making his first trip in the service of His Majesty … Cockney Lobby Ludd, eighteen, fighting against U-boat ""tinfish"" (torpedoes), arctic gales, and bone-weariness, hears the ribald tales and learns the tricks and techniques of survival from his salty older shipmates. But as the enemy mounts its attack, and the atmosphere intensifies, will the men’s camaraderie be enough to see them through?Or will The Tinfish Run turn out to be their final voyage?Bassett not only captures vividly the fear and boredom of life on a vessel at war--he makes complex tactical questions comprehensible and as taut and engrossing as the more personal aspects of combat at sea.‘Vividly described … the voyage as seen through the sleep-robbed eyes of matelots and officers alike’ - Daily Telegraph Ronald Bassett joined the Navy as a boy. His first ship was the cruiser Norfolk in which he served as a Telegraphist in the Arctic during the Bismarck action, and the North African landings. He served in landing craft during the invasion of Normandy.

Journey to Utah


Frank Roderus - 1977
    Stumpy was the kind of man who saw his duty and did what had to be done. When Janet Cate's three step-brothers showed up with less than honorable intentions, it was time for Stumpy to act.

A Morbid Taste for Bones


Ellis Peters - 1977
    Now, in 1137, the ambitious head of Shrewsbury Abbey has decided to acquire the sacred remains for his Benedictine order. Native Welshman Brother Cadfael is sent on the expedition to translate and finds the rustic villagers of Gwytherin passionately divided by the Benedictine's offer for the saint's relics. Canny, wise, and all too wordly, he isn't surprised when this taste for bones leads to bloody murder.The leading opponent to moving the grave has been shot dead with a mysterious arrow, and some say Winifred herself held the bow. Brother Cadfael knows a carnal hand did the killing. But he doesn't know that his plan to unearth a murderer may dig up a case of love and justice...where the wages of sin may be scandal or Cadfael's own ruin.

A Shadow of Gulls


Patricia Finney - 1977
    The story of Lugh Mac Romain, harper and reluctant warrior, as he struggles to escape the curse of the Queen Maeve of Connaught for killing her king and is caught up in the famous Cattle Raid of Cooley by his friendship with the great Champion of Ulster, Cuchulain of Muirthemne.

Tomorrow Is a River


Barbara Fitz Vroman - 1977
    

The Shad Treatment


Garrett Epps - 1977
    Thomas Jefferson "Tom Jeff" Shadwell is leading a "people's crusade" to liberate the Governor's Mansion from the grip of the conservative political machine that has controlled the state for fifty years. Against him are ranged the powerful forces that have kept the state back for so long--unreconstructed race-baiting politicians, gentleman farmers, giant corporations, and the "best families." The campaign promises to be the toughest, dirtiest, and most brutal in decades. But for Mac Evans, key aide in the Shadwell campaign, the election offers one last chance for his family to gain vindication and respect after years or defeat and ridicule. Inspired by events and personalities from the heated 1973 gubernatorial election.

Sun Horse, Moon Horse


Rosemary Sutcliff - 1977
    This picture-magic he returns to again and again as he grows up, to the puzzlement and ridicule of his fellows. In the end it is his gift that releases his tribe from their own conquerors and gives them the freedom to start their clan life anew.In this interpretation of how the White Horse of Uffington, in Berkdhire, might have been made, Rosemary Sutcliff has created a story of great sensitivity and understanding.

Riders To Cibola


Norman Zollinger - 1977
    Reprint. PW.

House of Men


Catherine Cookson - 1977
    Even so, Kate found it difficult to understand his peculiar hatred of his elder brother Logan, on whose charity Maurice was obliged to depend. But when she accidentally stumbled upon Maurice with Logan's fiancée , she became aware of some of the secrets of Tor-Fret, and realised she was getting too deeply involved with Logan Rossiter and the other inhabitants of the mysterious household.

I Came to Love You Late


Joyce Landorf Heatherley - 1977
    The author weaves a tenderly perceptive, intensely personal tale as seen through the eyes of Martha - sister to Lazarus and Mary, friend to Jesus. The story line runs from Martha's childhood, through the baptism of Jesus, right up to His final ascension after the crucifixion. Experience for yourself the hopes, the doubts, and the sheer amazement that were being expressed throughout Israel about the carpenter from Nazareth.

The Dangerous Game


Milton Dank - 1977
    Love of Paris and France prompts a sixteen-year-old to join the resistance movement shortly after the Nazi invasion of 1940.

The Wolf


Charles MacKie - 1977
    He was married to a royal countess and lived with a beautiful commoner. He was the legal representative of the National authority in territories north of the River Forth and he waged a bitter war on the Church in the Province of Moray and on its Bishop Alexander Bur.He burned two towns, plundered an abbey and destroyed a great cathedral. He was excommunicated, condemned by his king, blackened by historians. Could anything good or new be said about such a man? Nothing, until a chance uncovered the story of Philip Hogeston, soldier-priest, crusader and prisoner of the water-pit in the island of Lochindorb, the lair of the Wolf of Badenoch.

The View Beyond My Father


Mabel Esther Allan - 1977
    Fifteen-year-old Mary Anne discovers it is her father as well as her blindness that binds her to a narrow world.

Maxwell Street: Survival in a Bazaar


Ira Berkow - 1977