Here are 88 books that The Victoria Letters fans have personally recommended if you like
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Having edited 5 newspapers in North London a few years ago, I found that my love of reading–especially historical novels–expanded to writing once my business was sold to a well-known newspaper publishing company. All history fascinates me, as is obvious from my recommendations, and even though these could be listed as fiction, they all have a great deal of fact within them. I delved into historical reading as a very young girl and progressed from the Georgette Heyer novels to my current more in-depth novelists, so my range has been quite vast and varied over the years. I truly wish I had more time to read.
My interest in history once again comes to the fore in this book by Edward Rutherfurd. It is an epic saga that takes readers into the lives of five families in Salisbury, beginning in the Ice Age to 1985.
It follows two rival families who sought revenge on each other for over 400 years, whilst a stonemason’s family’s constructions spanned from the creation of Stonehenge to Salisbury Cathedral. It touches on the family of an exiled Roman soldier and an aristocrat who fell from grace, taking many generations for the family fortune to be revived.
This is a fascinating read, showing how the families, the land, and the buildings around them evolved and the skills that brought Salisbury to its intriguing place today. I found it a little heavy going at times, but it was well worth my perseverance.
'A high-speed cavalcade of our island story' DAILY EXPRESS 'Supremely well crafted and a delight to read' CHICAGO TRIBUNE 'A thundering good read' THE BOOKSELLER 'A richly imagined vision of history' SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
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FIVE INTERCONNECTED FAMILIES
Sarum weaves an enthralling saga of five families - the Wilsons, the Masons, the family of Porteus, the Shockleys, and the Godfreys - who reflect the changing character of Britain.
CENTURIES OF TURMOIL AND TYRANNY
In a novel of extraordinary richness, the whole sweep of British civilization unfolds through the story of one place, Sailsbury, from beyond recorded time…
Having edited 5 newspapers in North London a few years ago, I found that my love of reading–especially historical novels–expanded to writing once my business was sold to a well-known newspaper publishing company. All history fascinates me, as is obvious from my recommendations, and even though these could be listed as fiction, they all have a great deal of fact within them. I delved into historical reading as a very young girl and progressed from the Georgette Heyer novels to my current more in-depth novelists, so my range has been quite vast and varied over the years. I truly wish I had more time to read.
I read this book before I watched the TV series, and I admit that the series was not disappointing. The book reverts to prehistoric times for the origins of what was to become the town of Centennial in Colorado.
This is another story of the building of America, although from the opposite spectrum to my prior recommendation. It touches on the Indian tribes who fought long and hard to keep their land and continues on to cover all aspects of the eventual population, from trappers to cowboys and ranchers, and the hardships experienced in creating such a settlement in 1844.
I enjoy any book or TV series that shows the origins of how places or people came to be. This book certainly goes into such details and readers are pulled into the lives of several families through to relatively modern times. Mesmerising as only the expert storyteller James Michener can…
Written to commemorate the Bicentennial in 1976, James A. Michener’s magnificent saga of the Westis an enthralling celebration of the frontier. Brimming with the glory of America’s past, the story of Colorado—the Centennial State—is manifested through its people: Lame Beaver, the Arapaho chieftain and warrior, and his Comanche and Pawnee enemies; Levi Zendt, fleeing with his child bride from the Amish country; the cowboy, Jim Lloyd, who falls in love with a wealthy and cultured Englishwoman, Charlotte Seccombe. In Centennial, trappers, traders, homesteaders, gold seekers, ranchers, and hunters are brought together in the dramatic conflicts that shape the…
I’ve always loved history and have written four novels set in the past. Maybe I was drawn to the past because I partly grew up in Bath–a city where you seem to be living in the eighteenth century. But recent history tells us who we are now, and I’ve always wanted to deal with the subject of the Holocaust since, at the age of thirteen, I came across a book about it in my town’s public library. At that time, nobody talked about it, and I was traumatized by it. How could human beings do such things? I think puzzling over that is partly why I became a writer.
This powerful story angered many when it was published, but Styron is asking serious questions: How do you survive a terrible experience, especially one that forces you to make an agonizing choice? Can you, in fact, survive that? He takes what I believe is the most extreme case of survivor guilt imaginable, which is the heart-rending decision that Sophie is forced to make and which is the core of the novel.
That’s in the past–the recent past for the characters–and in the present, the three main people in the novel find themselves in a painful love triangle that arises specifically from those terrible events but which I found to be a very perceptive insight into a situation that many of us find ourselves in.
It’s about a different kind of choice but one which will cause pain, whatever is decided.
In this extraordinary novel, Stingo, an inexperienced twenty-two year old Southerner, takes us back to the summer of 1947 and a boarding house in a leafy Brooklyn suburb. There he meets Nathan, a fiery Jewish intellectual; and Sophie, a beautiful and fragile Polish Catholic. Stingo is drawn into the heart of their passionate and destructive relationship as witness, confidant and supplicant. Ultimately, he arrives at the dark core of Sophie's past: her memories of pre-war Poland, the concentration camp and - the essence of her terrible secret - her choice.
Having edited 5 newspapers in North London a few years ago, I found that my love of reading–especially historical novels–expanded to writing once my business was sold to a well-known newspaper publishing company. All history fascinates me, as is obvious from my recommendations, and even though these could be listed as fiction, they all have a great deal of fact within them. I delved into historical reading as a very young girl and progressed from the Georgette Heyer novels to my current more in-depth novelists, so my range has been quite vast and varied over the years. I truly wish I had more time to read.
I cannot remember how this book came into my possession. I have always been interested in various ethnic origins, and once I began reading this remarkable book, it was difficult to put down. It follows a small Sioux tribe from 1750 to 1834 when the tribe resisted the influence of the white man.
The book's name translates to "Clear the Way," and it certainly was true to its meaning, as it took all my powers of concentration to "clear the way" and understand the depths that the author Ruth Beebe Hill must have gone to in her research to make this book acceptable to interested readers.
It gives an in-depth understanding of the culture of these proud but violent people and, sadly, how some finally succumbed to the influences that they had so long fought against.
Partially based on fact, this multi-generational saga follows the lives of two Indian families, members of the Mahto band of the Teton Sioux, before the arrival of the white man
I have loved the world of Sherlock Holmes and the Victorian era ever since I first read A Study in Scarlet at age nine. Despite life getting in the way, I never lost my love for the character and the period. I continue to read both to this day. The five books I mention below are five that have stayed with me over the years. I hope you enjoy the books as much as I do.
One of the first nonfiction books I ever read about the Victorian period when I started writing, it is still my go-to reference book. I love its simplicity and the personal point of view comments from the author who is an historian who has recreated aspects of Victorian life for herself. I find the book both enchanting and interesting. It is one of my all-time favorite factual books.
Ruth Goodman believes in getting her hands dirty. Drawing on her own adventures living in re-created Victorian conditions, Goodman serves as our bustling and fanciful guide to nineteenth-century life. Proceeding from daybreak to bedtime, this charming, illustrative work celebrates the ordinary lives of the most perennially fascinating era of British history. From waking up to the rapping of a "knocker-upper man" on the window pane to lacing into a corset after a round of calisthenics, from slipping opium to the little ones to finally retiring to the bedroom for the ideal combination of "love, consideration, control and pleasure," the weird,…
I’m fascinated by the Victorians – and I’ve spent most of my career trying to understand them – because they’re so like us and so unlike us in many ways. They’re familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. I’m a historian of science, and I’m passionate about trying to understand why we think about the world – and about science – the way we do. I think it started with the Victorians, so understanding them really matters and getting it right rather than repeating the same old stories. I hope these books will help you put the Victorians in their place the way they helped me.
This is it. The original Victorian expose. I love the way Lytton Strachey takes his parents’ generation and pokes fun at their heroes. This is the first attempt to burst the Victorians’ bubble, and I think it’s brilliant. More than that, I don’t really think you can understand anything that’s been written about them since without starting here.
Strachey picks on four Victorian greats – Florence Nightingale included – and strips them naked. Not so great after all, he concludes. It’s the original tell-all biography.
Eminent Victorians marked an epoch in the art of biography; it also helped to crack the old myths of high Victorianism and to usher in a new spirit by which chauvinism, hypocrisy and the stiff upper lip were debunked. In it Strachey cleverly exposes the self-seeking ambitions of Cardinal Manning and the manipulative, neurotic Florence Nightingale; and in his essays on Dr Arnold and General Gordon his quarries are not only his subjects but also the public-school system and the whole structure of nineteenth-century liberal values.
As a fine arts major alumnus of Lake Forest College and Illinois Wesleyan University, I have written a variety of works, fiction and non, throughout my professional life. My preferred literary escape became the genre of British Mystery. I learned much from reading Martha Grimes in the 1990s. Her use of interplay between a character’s internal psychic landscape and the surrounding one interested me. As a mystery writer, I employ what I think of as light brushstrokes of the cozy genre while aiming for some depth of prose. A Lark Ascending has been described as an engaging escape from today.
The year is 1837 and Liberty is a fiercely independent young woman. The story begins with her crossing the Channel to find her father, only to discover that he had recently been killed in a duel. In the course of investigating what had happened, she comes upon a plot that involves treason, with the potential to spark another civil war.
What I love about Peacock’s work is her use of imagery in echoing a character’s psyche or situation. Horse lovers will enjoy Liberty’s relationship with her horse and her growing friendship with her good-hearted stable hand. I have not yet put my finger on it, but for some reason, I feel a hint of Edgar Allen Poe when I read her books.
A remarkable debut novel rich in atmosphere, color, and suspense, Caro Peacock's A Foreign Affair is an irresistible blend of history, adventure, and ingenious invention that brings an extraordinary new writer—and a truly endearing and unforgettable heroine—to the literary stage.
The year is 1837. Queen Victoria, barely eighteen, has just ascended to the throne of England, and a young woman named Liberty Lane has just had her first taste of true sorrow. Refusing to accept that her gentle, peace-loving father has been killed fighting a duel, she vows to see justice done. . . .
I'm a historian. But I’ve never been interested in Parliamentary debates, or important politicians. I’m much more interested in things like gender and entertainment. I always say that a lot more people have sex than become prime minister, so it makes more sense to study marriage than high politics! I like to learn about ordinary people, living their lives and loving their families, working and surviving, and trying to have a little fun along the way. I also love history of more fun and glamorous things—celebrities and scandals and spectacles and causes célèbres, hit plays, and best-selling novels. I have history degrees from Harvard and Yale and I’ve been publishing on nineteenth-century British history since 2000.
I thought I had read enough about Queen Victoria to last a lifetime, but I was wrong! This amazing book offers a new perspective on Queen Victoria as “an Indian Maharani” as well as “British monarch,” and explores not just what India meant to the queen, but what the queen meant to Indians.
An entirely original account of Victoria's relationship with the Raj, which shows how India was central to the Victorian monarchy from as early as 1837
"A widely and deeply researched, elegantly written, and vital portrayal of [Queen Victoria's] place in colonial Indian affairs."-Journal of Modern History
In this engaging and controversial book, Miles Taylor shows how both Victoria and Albert were spellbound by India, and argues that the Queen was humanely, intelligently, and passionately involved with the country throughout her reign and not just in the last decades. Taylor also reveals the way in which Victoria's influence as empress contributed…
I grew up in a reading and history-loving family. My parents read all the time, and their books of choice combined historical fiction and nonfiction. It’s no wonder I ended up teaching high school history for over three decades. The first books I read were my older brother’s hand-me-down Hardy Boys. Then, I went on to Agatha Christie. Books written in the 1920s and 30s were historical mysteries by the time I read them decades later, so the historical mystery genre is a natural fit. As for the Victorian age, all that gaslight and fog makes it the perfect milieu for murder.
The author’s unusual lens made this a captivating history. Murphy examines Victoria’s reign through the multiple attempts on the queen’s life. While the title isn’t entirely accurate (one would-be assassin used a walking stick rather than a gun), Murphy makes a persuasive case for the monarchy’s “rebirth.”
Defying death helped the queen survive some rough patches in her reign. Through eight attempts to kill her, the queen modeled “keep calm and carry on” in the best British tradition, and the public adored her pluck. After the final gunman failed to murder the queen, the aging Victoria said, “It is worth being shot at to see how much one is loved.”
'It is worth being shot at to see how much one is loved.' - Queen Victoria.
Queen Victoria was attacked an astonishing eight times during her sixty-three year reign.
Victoria's would-be assassins succeeded in changing the course of British history; whose penal system, legal system and policing would never be the same again. Taking the queen's mad, marginalized attackers as his starting point for an investigation of the entire era, Paul Thomas Murphy weaves elegantly through all layers of nineteenth century society and culture. A rollicking, riveting history, Shooting Victoria is the most multi-faceted story of Victorian Britain to date.
I have been a lover of histories and mysteries for as long as I can remember. Equal parts museum junkie and Dateline addict, I cannot get enough of history and whodunnits. From Poirot and Conan Doyle to Bernard Cornwall and Ken Follett, I love them all. As a kid, reading with a flashlight under the covers was a favorite pastime, and I wore out my library card. As an adult, I head to the true crime section of the bookstore first. I love that there are books that blend my two passions so well, and I hope you enjoy this list of historical mysteries as much as I do.
I feel that Sherlock Holmes and Cyrus Barker would be friends, but even more so, Dr. Watson and Thomas Llewelyn would have much to discuss. I was hesitant to begin a new series set in Victorian London, but I’m so glad I read this book and every book in the series that followed.
It Involved is a twisty mystery rich in setting and history. Barker and Llewelyn are a formidable duo when it comes to crime fighting and detection, and Llewelyn’s humor offsets (and sometimes ratchets up) the tension.
An atmospheric debut novel set on the gritty streets of Victorian London, Some Danger Involved introduces detective Cyrus Barker and his assistant, Thomas Llewelyn, as they work to solve the gruesome murder of a young scholar in London's Jewish ghetto.
When the eccentric and enigmatic Cyrus Barker takes on the recent murder case of a young scholar in London's Jewish ghetto, he realizes that he must hire an assistant, and out of all who answer an ad for a position with "some danger involved," he chooses downtrodden Llewelyn, a gutsy young man with a murky past.
