Category Archives: Historical Fiction

Becoming the Dark Prince by Kerri Maniscalco 

Becoming the Dark Prince by Kerri Maniscalco

Enigmatic, brooding, and darkly handsome, Thomas Cresswell has always been the one mystery Audrey Rose has never been able to fully solve. As brilliant partners in crime investigation, they understand each other perfectly…but as young lovers, their passionate natures have led to both euphoria and heartbreak throughout the Stalking Jack the Ripper series.

This novella features a collection of scenes that takes place during and after the pair’s horrifying Atlantic voyage in Escaping From Houdini. Experience new and familiar scenes from Thomas’s unique point of view, including an intensely personal look into his plea for Audrey Rose’s hand in marriage.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Blood & physical injury depiction
  • Death of a mother mentioned
  • Murder

Capturing the Devil by Kerri Maniscalco 

Audrey Rose Wadsworth and Thomas Cresswell have landed in America, a bold, brash land unlike the genteel streets of London they knew. But like London, the city of Chicago hides its dark secrets well. When the two attend the spectacular World’s Fair, they find the once-in-a-lifetime event tainted with reports of missing people and unsolved murders. Determined to help, Audrey Rose and Thomas begin their investigations, only to find themselves facing a serial killer unlike any they’ve heard of before. Identifying him is one thing, but capturing him and getting dangerously lost in the infamous Murder Hotel he constructed… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Blood depiction
  • Medical procedures (autopsies)
  • Death of a mother mentioned
  • Graphic murder
  • Poisoning
  • Animal butchery

Escaping from Houdini by Kerri Maniscalco 

Escaping from Houdini by Kerri Maniscalco

Audrey Rose Wadsworth and her partner-in-crime-investigation, Thomas Cresswell, are en route to New York to help solve another blood-soaked mystery. Embarking on a week-long voyage across the Atlantic on the opulent RMS Etruria, they’re delighted to discover a travelling troupe of circus performers, fortune tellers, and a certain charismatic young escape artist entertaining the first-class passengers nightly.

But then, privileged young women begin to go missing without explanation, and a series of brutal slayings shocks the entire ship. The disturbing influence of the Moonlight Carnival pervades the decks as the murders grow ever more freakish, with nowhere to escape except the unforgiving sea… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Cheating
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Dead bodies & autopsies
  • Murder
  • Knife violence & stabbing
  • Hanging
  • Poisoning
  • Blackmail
  • Animal attack

Hunting Prince Dracula by Kerri Maniscalco 

Hunting Prince Dracula by Kerri Maniscalco

Following the grief and horror of her discovery of Jack the Ripper’s true identity, Audrey Rose Wadsworth has no choice but to flee London and its memories. Together with the arrogant yet charming Thomas Cresswell, she journeys to the dark heart of Romania, home to one of Europe’s best schools of forensic medicine… and to another notorious killer, Vlad the Impaler, whose thirst for blood became legend.

But her life’s dream is soon tainted by blood-soaked discoveries in the halls of the school’s forbidding castle, and Audrey Rose is compelled to investigate the strangely familiar murders. What she finds brings all her terrifying fears to life once again.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
  • Panic attack
  • Drug abuse mentioned
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Dead bodies & autopsies
  • Murder
  • Poisoning
  • Fire

Stalking Jack the Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco 

Stalking Jack the Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco

Seventeen-year-old Audrey Rose Wadsworth was born a lord’s daughter, with a life of wealth and privilege stretched out before her. But between the social teas and silk dress fittings, she leads a forbidden secret life.

Against her stern father’s wishes and society’s expectations, Audrey often slips away to her uncle’s laboratory to study the gruesome practise of forensic medicine. When her work on a string of savagely killed corpses drags Audrey into the investigation of a serial murderer, her search for answers brings her close to her own sheltered world.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Dead bodies & autopsies
  • Needles
  • Substance addiction
  • Drug abuse
  • Psychiatric hospital
  • Murder
  • Physical assault

The Tiger’s Wife by Téa Obreht 

The Tiger’s Wife by Téa Obreht

In a Balkan country mending from years of conflict, Natalia, a young doctor, arrives on a mission of mercy at an orphanage by the sea. By the time she and her lifelong friend Zóra begin to inoculate the children there, she feels age-old superstitions and secrets gathering everywhere around her. Secrets her outwardly cheerful hosts have chosen not to tell her. Secrets involving the strange family digging for something in the surrounding vineyards. Secrets hidden in the landscape itself.

But Natalia is also confronting a private, hurtful mystery of her own: the inexplicable circumstances surrounding her beloved grandfather’s recent death. After telling her grandmother that he was on his way to meet Natalia… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Rape
  • Domestic abuse & violence
  • Suicide

Empire of Ivory by Naomi Novik 

Empire of Ivory by Naomi Novik

Tragedy has struck His Majesty’s Aerial Corps, whose magnificent fleet of fighting dragons and their human captains valiantly defend England’s shores against the encroaching armies of Napoleon Bonaparte. An epidemic of unknown origin and no known cure is decimating the noble dragons’ ranks– forcing the hopelessly stricken into quarantine. Now only Temeraire and a pack of newly recruited dragons remain uninfected–and stand as the only means of an airborne defense against France’s ever bolder sorties.

Bonaparte’s dragons are already harrowing Britain’s ships at sea. Only one recourse remains: Temeraire and his captain, Will Laurence… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Unplanned pregnancy
  • Plague
  • War themes

Black Powder War by Naomi Novik 

Black Powder War by Naomi Novik

Before Captain Will Laurence can prepare his crew for the slow voyage home from China, new orders arrive for him and his dragon, Temeraire: they must fly home immediately, stopping only in Istanbul to collect three priceless dragon eggs, purchased by the British government from the Ottoman Empire.

But the cross-continental journey is fraught with danger; not only will they have to scale mountains and traverse vast hostile deserts, but a Machiavellian herald precedes them, spreading political menace in her wake. Holding Temeraire responsible for the death of her princely companion, Lien has absconded from China consumed by vengeance. If she can, she will destroy everything and everyone Temeraire loves.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Death from a fall
  • Animal death
  • War themes

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik 

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik

Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders, but her father’s inability to collect his debts has left his family on the edge of poverty–until Miryem takes matters into her own hands. Hardening her heart, the young woman sets out to claim what is owed and soon gains a reputation for being able to turn silver into gold.

When an ill-advised boast draws the attention of the king of the Staryk–grim fey creatures who seem more ice than flesh–Miryem’s fate, and that of two kingdoms, will be forever altered. Set an impossible challenge by the nameless king, Miryem unwittingly spins a web… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Antisemitism
  • Domestic abuse
  • Graphic physical child abuse
  • Rape & sexual assault discussed
  • Alcohol abuse
  • Death of a parent
  • Death of a child
  • Death of a sibling
  • Murder
  • Animal death

The Library Book by Susan Orlean

The Library Book by Susan Orlean

On the morning of April 29, 1986, a fire alarm sounded in the Los Angeles Public Library. As the moments passed, the patrons and staff who had been cleared out of the building realized this was not the usual fire alarm. As one fireman recounted, “Once that first stack got going, it was ‘Goodbye, Charlie.’” The fire was disastrous: it reached 2000 degrees and burned for more than seven hours. By the time it was extinguished, it had consumed four hundred thousand books and damaged seven hundred thousand more. Investigators descended on the scene, but more than thirty years later, the mystery remains: Did someone purposefully set fire to the library—and if so, who?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Homomisia
  • Death from HIV/AIDS
  • Fire & arson