Category Archives: Historical Fiction

A Chance at Love by Beverly Jenkins

Loreli Winters never imagined she’d end up a “mail-order bride” in middle-of-nowhere Kansas — until the two adorable orphan nieces of a dusky dream named Jake Reed beg her to be their new “mama.” And one look at the dark, devastatingly handsome man is enough to entice her to abandon her California plans and stay put for a while in this one-horse frontier town. Strong, sensible Jake was hoping for a wife to help him raise his girls, but Loreli may be more than he can handle. He can’t stop wondering what it would be like to hold the fiery enchantress close and kiss her deeply. Surely he could never compete with the… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Slut-shaming
  • Rape recounted (off-page)
  • Murder
  • Kidnapping
  • Arson

Rebel by Beverly Jenkins

Valinda Lacey’s mission in the steamy heart of New Orleans is to help the newly emancipated community survive and flourish. But soon she discovers that here, freedom can also mean danger. When thugs destroy the school she has set up and then target her, Valinda runs for her life—and straight into the arms of Captain Drake LeVeq. As an architect from an old New Orleans family, Drake has a deeply personal interest in rebuilding the city. Raised by strong women, he recognizes Valinda’s determination. And he can’t stop admiring—or wanting—her. But when Valinda’s father demands she return home to marry a man she doesn’t love… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical racism & homophobia
  • Slavery discussed
  • Attempted sexual assault
  • Murder & gun violence
  • Arson

All in Her Hands by Audrey Blake

Dr. Nora Gibson is the only female surgeon in London. In all of England, even. After earning her medical degree and overcoming the prejudice of those who wished to see her fail, she’s finally earned her place at the Great Queen Street Hospital alongside her newlywed husband and her eccentric but ailing adoptive father, the great Dr. Horace Croft. But peace is hard to come by as a physician, and for one like Nora, it’s almost impossible. When Nora takes up the fight to bring midwives into the medical field, her already fragile reputa… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical misogyny
  • Physical injury & illness and medical treatment (theme), including a cholera outbreak
  • Unplanned pregnancy (protagonist)

The Surgeon’s Daughter by Audrey Blake

Nora Beady, the only female student at a prestigious medical school in Bologna, is a rarity. In the 19th century women are expected to remain at home and raise children, so her unconventional, indelicate ambitions to become a licensed surgeon offend the men around her. Under constant scrutiny, Nora’s successes are taken for granted; her mistakes used as proof that women aren’t suited to the field. Everything changes when she allies herself with Magdalena Morenco, the sole female doctor on-staff. Together the two women develop new techniques to… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical misogyny
  • Traumatic childbirth & stillbirth
  • Physical injury & illness and medical treatment (theme)
  • Asphyxia (choking)
  • Death of a child

A Restless Truth by Freya Marske

Maud Blyth has always longed for adventure. She expected plenty of it when she volunteered to serve as an old lady’s companion on an ocean liner, in order to help her beloved older brother unravel a magical conspiracy that began generations ago. What she didn’t expect was for the old lady in question to turn up dead on the first day of the voyage. Now she has to deal with a dead body, a disrespectful parrot, and the lovely, dangerously outrageous Violet Debenham, who’s also returning home to England. Violet is everything that Maud has been trained to distrust yet… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Infidelity & spousal abandonment*
  • Attempted sexual assault
  • Emotional parental abuse recounted
  • Suicide mentioned (secondary character)
  • Alcohol consumption & drugging
  • Blood & gore depiction, including minor self-injury for blood, dead bodies & emesis
  • Death of parents in a car accident recounted
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Kidnapping
  • Knife violence
  • Loss of autonomy (ghost possession)

Context : Violet is technically married to a man who abandoned her & stole her possessions; due to his disappearance, she is unable to dissolve their marriage and never reveals this to her love interest.

The Other Side of the River by Alda P. Dobbs

Petra Luna is in America, having escaped the Mexican Revolution and the terror of the Federales. Now that they are safe, Petra and her family can begin again, in this country that promises so much. Still, twelve-year-old Petra knows that her abuelita, little sister, and baby brother depend on her to survive. She leads her family from a smallpox-stricken refugee camp on the Texas border to the buzzing city of San Antonio, where they work hard to build a new life. And for the first time ever, Petra has a chance to learn to read and write. Yet Petra also sees in America attitudes she thought… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical racism, classism & sexism
  • Death of a mother from childbirth mentioned
  • Mexican Revolution recounted

Barefoot Dreams of Petra Luna by Alda P. Dobbs

It is 1913, and twelve-year-old Petra Luna’s mama has died while the Revolution rages in Mexico. Before her papa is dragged away by soldiers, Petra vows to him that she will care for the family she has left―her abuelita, little sister Amelia, and baby brother Luisito―until they can be reunited. They flee north through the unforgiving desert as their town burns, searching for safe harbour in a world that offers none. Each night when Petra closes her eyes, she holds her dreams close, especially her long-held desire to learn to read. Abuelita calls these barefoot dreams… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Classism
  • Anti-Indigenous racism
  • Starvation & water scarcity
  • Death of a mother from childbirth recounted
  • Police & military violence including forced conscription and burning of a village

The First State of Being by Erin Entrada Kelly

When twelve-year-old Michael Rosario meets a mysterious boy from the future, his life is changed forever. It’s August 1999. For twelve-year-old Michael Rosario, life at Fox Run Apartments in Red Knot, Delaware, is as ordinary as ever—except for the looming Y2K crisis and his overwhelming crush on his fifteen-year-old babysitter, Gibby. But when a disoriented teenage boy named Ridge appears out of nowhere, Michael discovers there is more to life than stockpiling supplies and pining over Gibby. It turns out that Ridge is carefree, confident, and cold, things… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Hospitalisation for illness
  • Financial difficulties
  • Bullying

Carrie and the Great Storm by Jessica Gunderson

Twelve-year-old Carrie is excited to spend the night at her best friend Betsy’s house one Saturday night in the turn of the century Galveston, Texas. But when her parents receive a last-minute invitation to a high-society party, they insist Carrie stay home to babysit her little brother, Henry. Despite a storm brewing — and Carrie’s protests over the change in plans — her parents go to the party. As the storm approaches, the streets begin flooding. Henry is scared, and Carrie tries to calm him. But then hurricane hits, and the house is shaken from its foundation. Carrie must make… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Great Galveston Hurricane & floods

Audrey Under the Big Top by Jessica Gunderson

12-year-old Audrey wants nothing more than to be a performer & aerialist, but that feels far from reality in 1944 Connecticut. So when she learns the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus is coming to town, Audrey is determined to be there under the big top. It’s her only chance to see the Flying Wallendas, a world-renowned highwire act, perform. Audrey convinces her mother to let her take her 6-year-old twin sisters with her to the show. But disaster strikes when a fire breaks out under the big top. Can Audrey escape–and find her siblings–before the tent comes crashing down?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Hartford Circus Fire, including death from burning & burns (on-page)