The most recommended books about Napoleon Bonaparte

Bizarrely not many quality works on Napoleon’s exile and afterlife exist in English. It is much to Dwyer’s credit to have written a superb account of the stricken eagle’s exile on Saint Helena.

It depicts well how the reality of confinement contrasted markedly with the myth that was fostered by exiles. This is an excellent analysis of these humid days on the South Atlantic followed in the second half by a masterful analysis of how Napoleon became the new Prometheus and Christ for liberals who opposed the Restoration. A riveting read.

I came across the Uncle John series by accident while rummaging through books at a used bookstore and have become a lifelong fan.

This edition covered one of my favorite subjects, history. If you are aware of the series, you know it's full of fun stories, and the way they are provided is half the fun. This is a must-read for trivia and American miscellanea enthusiasts.

The fall of Empires is always painful regardless of their nature.

This was definitely the case for Napoleon's ephemeral Western European multiethnic polity. Within three short years, his imperial dream of placing Europe under a uniform system collapsed, soaked in blood and consumed by flames.

This is the final volume of Michael Broers's definitive three-volume history of Napoleon. He combines the erudition of Edward Gibbon in chronicling the decline and fall of the Napoleonic behemoth with the nostalgia and sensitivity of Marcel Proust.

Every page is a work of art and spellbinding. 

“This enthralling biography and detective story convincingly identifies the real-life model for Baroness Orczy’s Scarlet Pimpernel. It delves into the politics and espionage of Revolutionary and Napoleonic eras.” The real Scarlet Pimpernel, Louis Bayard was an amazing person. Baroness Orczy knew him in her childhood as Lewis Duval, a London-based French lawyer. The story of his exploits in Orczy’s novels is just a shadow of all he accomplished, which Sparrow brings to glittering life. His allies and enemies, how he influenced Napoleon and Pitt, as well as other leaders of the time, and accomplished the impossible many times over, comes alive in this story that begins in his childhood. The boy and man for whom “seeking danger was a compulsion”. It’s how real heroes, ever hidden in the shadows, are made.

I’m using this “thundering good read” now while writing my own YA series. Sent back to 1793 Lyon, Xandra… show more.

When Greg Reid asked me to co-author a novel with him that became our book, Passport to Success, I thought I would sample some of his previous collaborations. When I discovered he had written a book with my friend Sharon Lechter, I decided to give it a try. Three Feet from Gold is based on a classic story brought to light by Napoleon Hill. Many people fail because they are afraid to persevere, but once you read Three Feet from Gold, you’ll be afraid to quit. Success is your destiny and you’re closer than you think. 

When most English readers think of a novel about the French Revolution, they come up with A Tale of Two Cities. In contrast, Daphne du Maurier’s The Glass Blowers is almost forgotten. This is unfair, because it is both a marvellous read and a painstakingly researched and remarkably balanced evocation of France’s upheavals from 1789 right through to the 1840s. It is a fictionalized history of Daphne du Maurier’s own ancestors, the glass-blowers of the title, and the divisions and tragedies the Revolution brought to them. A remarkable and moving book.

Jenny Uglow looks at the Napoleonic Wars period from the bottom up -- what life was like, how political issues affected the person in the street. Bankers, clergymen, working men and women, manufacturers, and statesmen all play roles in her narrative. Through the letters and diaries of ordinary people, she produces a vibrant picture of life in a period of unprecedented political, social, and economic turmoil. She still ends with the Battle of Waterloo, but Waterloo as experienced by the junior officers and enlisted men. A fascinating book, that shows how high politics and world events affected ordinary people and is highly accessible to general readers.

In 1812 Britain ruled the waves and Napoleon ruled everything else. We in the twenty-first century don’t realise how difficult and dangerous those times really were, how much of an analogy can be drawn with the dark days of World War II, when Britain stood alone against the forces in Europe. While the main plot line appears to be a simple romance, in fact Bennetts has gathered together strand after strand of conflict into a rich, absorbing tapestry. There's code-breaking, social mores, how to partake of snuff, politics, the assassination of the British PM. The story is utterly absorbing and very, very real.

Napoleon Bonaparte brought a decade of revolutionary upheaval to an end when he seized power with the army in November 1799, but he had been made a general by the Revolution and was one of its most celebrated soldiers. The Revolution opened up opportunities for this Corsican “outsider” which would have been impossible before the Revolution: he grabbed them. Dwyer’s prize-winning account of Napoleon’s checkered rise to power at the age of thirty is also a gripping narrative of the unpredictability and drama of the revolutionary decade. It reveals the making of a man whose brilliance, military genius, and vision was qualified by his cynicism, cruelty, and vanity. 

Philip Haythornthwaite’s Napoleonic Source Book is a comprehensive overview of the army and navy commanders, campaigns, regiments, uniforms, and weapons of not just the great powers, but every state that fought in the Napoleonic Era. The 200 or so illustrations and maps, and the 700 entry glossary are first-rate.