Book picks similar to
Signed, A Paddy by Lisa Boyle
historical-fiction
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fiction
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Daughter of a Daughter of a Queen
Sarah Bird - 2018
According to her mother, she was a captive, bound by her noble warrior blood to escape the enemy. Her means of deliverance is Union general Phillip Henry “Smash ‘em Up” Sheridan, the outcast of West Point who takes the rawboned, prideful young woman into service. At war’s end, having tasted freedom, Cathy refuses to return to servitude and makes the monumental decision to disguise herself as a man and join the Army’s legendary Buffalo Soldiers.Alone now in the ultimate man’s world, Cathy must fight not only for her survival and freedom, but she vows to never give up on finding her mother, her little sister, and the love of the only man strong and noble enough to win her heart. Inspired by the stunning, true story of Private Williams, this American heroine comes to vivid life in a sweeping and magnificent tale about one woman’s fight for freedom, respect and independence.
Think of Me
Frances Liardet - 2022
Covered in dust, Yvette and James hold hands for the first time as bombs explode above them. As the war rages on, they will find their way back to each other time and again, their love a beacon for their survival. After the war, their happiness takes root in England and blossoms, until a tragic event drives a wedge between them. The way back to one another is uncharted territory that both must be brave enough to face. 1974. Ten years after his wife's death and with his son now at university, James craves change. He moves to the beautiful English village of Upton not thirty minutes from the city where he brought his bride Yvette, nearly twenty-five years ago. There he discovers a scarf that lights the dark edges of his memory. Could it be Yvette's? As James makes a new home for himself and gently presses into the feelings the scarf evokes, he begins to unlock new revelations about his past that change everything he believes. Revelations that just might give James a new reason to live and the possibility of new love at last, after ten years alone.
A Paris Secret
Caroline Montague - 2019
A terrible sacrifice. A second chance... 1952. In the fragile atmosphere of post-war Paris, Sophie Bernot is training as a heart surgeon. A young woman in a man's world, Sophie is determined to bury her past and forge her medical career, whatever the costs.Across the channel, Sebastian Ogilvie is burning with ambition for his first architectural project. As his schemes lead him to France, and to a chance encounter with Sophie, his future seems full of promise.But when Sophie and Sebastian find themselves entangled in a brief, passionate affair, they each face a choice that will change their lives irrevocably, and a secret that will take years to be uncovered...
Sweeping from Paris to London, to the snow-capped peaks of the Alps, this is an unforgettable story of passion, heartache and forgiveness. Perfect for fans of Santa Montefiore and Lucinda Riley
Within These Lines
Stephanie Morrill - 2019
Despite the scandal it would cause and that inter-racial marriage is illegal in California, Evalina and Taichi vow they will find a way to be together. But anti-Japanese feelings erupt across the country after the attack on Pearl Harbor, and Taichi and his family are forced to give up their farm and move to an internment camp.Degrading treatment make life at Manzanar Relocation Center difficult. Taichi’s only connection to the outside world are treasured letters from Evalina. Feeling that the only action she can take to help Taichi is to speak out on behalf of all Japanese Americans, Evalina becomes increasingly vocal at school and at home. Meanwhile, inside Manzanar, fighting between different Japanese-American factions arises. Taichi begins to doubt he will ever leave the camp alive.With tensions running high and their freedom on the line, Evalina and Taichi must hold true to their values and believe in their love to make a way back to each other against unbelievable odds.
The Last Book Party
Karen Dukess - 2019
With her professional ambitions floundering, Eve jumps at the chance to attend an early summer gathering at the Cape Cod home of famed New Yorker writer Henry Grey and his poet wife, Tillie. Dazzled by the guests and her burgeoning crush on the hosts’ artistic son, Eve lands a new job as Henry Grey’s research assistant and an invitation to Henry and Tillie’s exclusive and famed "Book Party"— where attendees dress as literary characters. But by the night of the party, Eve discovers uncomfortable truths about her summer entanglements and understands that the literary world she so desperately wanted to be a part of is not at all what it seems.A page-turning, coming-of-age story, written with a lyrical sense of place and a profound appreciation for the sustaining power of books, The Last Book Party shows what happens when youth and experience collide and what it takes to find your own voice.
Always and Forever
Soraya M. Lane - 2016
They have a dream house and a dream marriage, and very soon they’ll have a dream family too. But life is rarely that simple. When their beautiful life is rocked by tragedy, they are forced to make an unbearable choice. Suddenly the future they’ve built together looks fragile and exposed.With aching hearts and their love on the line, they set off on a road trip through the stunning Californian landscape, hoping that time—and distance from the life they thought perfect—will help them start again. Matt is desperate not to lose Lisa, but as they confront their grief in different ways, he may have lost her already.Where there is love there ought to be strength, but this love has been tested to its limits. Have they endured too much heartbreak for one couple to take? Or will a journey down memory lane put them back on the road to love, hope—and each other?
The Eternal Audience of One
Rémy Ngamije - 2019
The most one can do is make some sort of start and then work toward some kind of ending.One might as well start with Séraphin: playlist-maker, nerd-jock hybrid, self-appointed merchant of cool, Rwandan, stifled and living in Windhoek, Namibia. Soon he will leave the confines of his family life for the cosmopolitan city of Cape Town, in South Africa, where loyal friends, hormone-saturated parties, adventurous conquests, and race controversies await. More than that, his long-awaited final year in law school promises to deliver a crucial puzzle piece of the Great Plan immigrant: a degree from a prestigious university.But a year is more than the sum of its parts, and en route to the future, the present must be lived through and even the past must be survived.
The Rib King
Ladee Hubbard - 2021
The groundskeeper is part of the household’s all-black staff, along with “Miss Mamie,” the talented cook, pretty new maid Jennie Williams, and three young kitchen apprentices—the latest orphan boys Mr. Barclay has taken in to "civilize" boys like August.But the Barclays fortunes have fallen, and their money is almost gone. When a prospective business associate proposes selling Miss Mamie’s delicious rib sauce to local markets under the brand name “The Rib King”—using a caricature of a wildly grinning August wearing a jewel-encrusted crown on the label—Mr. Barclay, desperate for cash, agrees. Yet neither Miss Mamie nor August will see a dime. Humiliated, August grows increasingly distraught, his anger building to a rage that explodes in shocking tragedy. Elegantly written and exhaustively researched, The Rib King is an unsparing examination of America’s fascination with black iconography and exploitation that redefines African American stereotypes in literature. In this powerful, disturbing, and timely novel, Ladee Hubbard reveals who people actually are, and most importantly, who and what they are not.
Storms Gather Between Us
Clare Flynn - 2019
Since escaping his family’s notoriety in Australia Will Kidd has spent a decade sailing the seas, never looking back. Content to live the life of a wanderer, everything changes in a single moment when he comes face to face with a ghost from his past on a cloudy beach in Liverpool.The daughter of an abusive zealot, every step of Hannah Dawson's life has been laid out for her... until she meets Will by chance and is set on a new path. Their love is forbidden and forces on all sides divide them, but their bond is undeniable. Now, they will have to fight against all the odds to escape the chains of their histories and find their way back to one another.
A compelling tale of family secrets and love against the odds, perfect for fans of Fiona Valpy and Gill Paul.
Praise for Storms Gather Between Us 'Another great book by Clare Flynn’ Reader Review‘A really gripping and moving pre WWII story’ Reader Review‘I would recommend this book without hesitation’ Reader Review‘Very descriptive, immersive and well written. This book is guaranteed to make you turn each and every page.’ Reader Review‘I was totally gripped from the first page’ Reader Review
The Wayward Spy
Susan Ouellette - 2021
The consequences haven’t.When her fiancé, a CIA operative accused of treason, is killed overseas, intelligence analyst Maggie Jenkins smells cover-up and sets out to clear his name. Maggie disobeys direct orders and travels to Tbilisi, Georgia, to follow a trail littered with secrets and lies, corruption and deceit, risking her own life to expose the terrorist threat at the intersection where the Russian Mafia, Chechen rebels, Al Qaeda and … US government officials meet.From the halls of power in Washington, D.C. to the political chaos of the former Soviet Union, Maggie must confront players from the intelligence, political, and criminal worlds who will do anything to stop her. How far will Maggie go to uncover the truth?
Yonder
Jabari Asim - 2022
Their owners call them captives. They are taught their captors’ tongues and their beliefs but they have a language and rituals all their own. In a world that would be allegorical if it weren’t saturated in harsh truths, Cato and William meet at Placid Hall, a plantation in an unspecified part of the American South. Subject to the whims of their tyrannical and eccentric captor, Cannonball Greene, they never know what harm may befall them: inhumane physical toil in the plantation’s quarry by day, a beating by night, or the sale of a loved one at any moment. It’s that cruel practice—the wanton destruction of love, the belief that Black people aren’t even capable of loving—that hurts the most. It hurts the reserved and stubborn William, who finds himself falling for Margaret, a small but mighty woman with self-possession beyond her years. And it hurts Cato, whose first love, Iris, was sold off with no forewarning. He now finds solace in his hearty band of friends, including William, who is like a brother; Margaret; Little Zander; and Milton, a gifted artist. There is also Pandora, with thick braids and long limbs, whose beauty calls to him. Their relationships begin to fray when a visiting minister with a mysterious past starts to fill their heads with ideas about independence. He tells them that with freedom comes the right to choose the small things—when to dine, when to begin and end work—as well as the big things, such as whom and how to love. Do they follow the preacher and pursue the unknown? Confined in a landscape marked by deceit and uncertainty, who can they trust? In an elegant work of monumental imagination that will reorient how we think of the legacy of America’s shameful past, Jabari Asim presents a beautiful, powerful, and elegiac novel that examines intimacy and longing in the quarters while asking a vital question: What would happen if an enslaved person risked everything for love?
The White Girl
Tony Birch - 2019
After her daughter disappeared and left her with her granddaughter Sissy to raise on her own, Odette has managed to stay under the radar of the welfare authorities who are removing fair-skinned Aboriginal children from their families. When a new policeman arrives in town, determined to enforce the law, Odette must risk everything to save Sissy and protect everything she loves.In The White Girl, Miles-Franklin-shortlisted author Tony Birch shines a spotlight on the 1960s and the devastating government policy of taking Indigenous children from their families.
The Traitor
V.S. Alexander - 2020
In the summer of 1942, as war rages across Europe, a series of anonymous leaflets appears around the University of Munich, speaking out against escalating Nazi atrocities. The leaflets are hidden in public places, or mailed to addresses selected at random from the phone book. Natalya Petrovich, a student, knows who is behind the leaflets—a secret group called the White Rose, led by siblings Hans and Sophie Scholl and their friends. As a volunteer nurse on the Russian front, Natalya witnessed the horrors of war first-hand. She willingly enters the White Rose’s circle, where every hushed conversation, every small act of dissent could mean imprisonment or death at the hands of an infuriated Gestapo. Natalya risks everything alongside her friends, hoping the power of words will encourage others to resist. But even among those she trusts most, there is no guarantee of safety—and when danger strikes, she must take an extraordinary gamble in her own personal struggle to survive.
Remember Me: A Spanish Civil War Novel
Mario Escobar - 2019
In 1937, at Mexico’s request and offer, nearly 500 children from Spain—remembered as Los Niños de Morelia—were relocated via ship to Mexico to escape the war’s violence. These children traveled across the sea without their families and were expected to return at the war’s end. No one could have foreseen another world war was on the way—or that Franco’s regime would prevent the children from coming home. These enduring conflicts trapped the children in a country far from their homeland, and many never made it back.Remember Me is Mario Escobar’s novelization of these events, as told by a fictional survivor—one of the children of Morelia—who looks back upon his life after making the long and devastating journey across the Atlantic. This story explores the endurance of the human spirit as well as the quandary of a parent’s impossible decision, asking: At what cost do you protect your child in the face of uncertainty?
Ulrich
James WalkerJames Walker - 2018
On his journey he meets Tau, a freed African slave, Ima, a vengeful German war maiden, and Sigmund, a gentle giant caught between worlds. Together they must ally with the Roman Legion to fight against an evil that threatens all the civilized world and pursue justice for those they have lost. Ulrich is the first novel of a series that explores events in and around the Roman empire of the fourth century A.D. A terrible force of invaders, the Alemanni, throw a continent into chaos on their quest for power and revenge and only a young Caesar Julian stands in their way. Action and adventure combine with historical accuracy to create an epic tale of hate, triumph, love, and loss. Through their actions our heroes raise and topple empires and make choices that shape the course of history.
