Historical Biographical Fiction

January, 1980. At the height of the Cold War, Petra Kelly inspires hundreds of thousands to take to the streets to protest the placement of nuclear missiles on West German soil - including a NATO general named Emil Gerhardt, who shocks the establishment by converting to the cause. Petra and her general not only vault to fame as the stars of the Green Party, but they also fall in love. Then Manfred Schwartz, an ex-lover, urges Petra to draw back the curtain on Emil's war record, and they enter a world both complicated and threatening.

In this illuminating biographical novel, Sherry Jones spans Josephine Baker's early years in servitude and poverty in America to her rise to fame as a showgirl in her famous banana skirt to her activism against discrimination, and her many loves and losses. From 1920s Paris to 1960s Washington to her final, triumphant performance, one of the most extraordinary lives of the 20th century comes to stunning life on the page. With intimate prose and comprehensive research, Sherry Jones brings Josephine Baker into focus for the first time in a joyous celebration of a life lived in technicolor.

A seductive literary mystery and mutigenerational story inspired by true events, The Last Confessions of Sylvia P. imaginatively brings into focus the period of promise and tragedy that marked the writing of Sylvia Plath’s modern classic The Bell Jar. Lee Kravetz uses a prismatic narrative formed from three distinct fictional perspectives to bring Plath to life—that of her psychiatrist, a rival poet, and years later, a curator of antiquities.

As a promising young actress, Sun Weishi made the critical decision to pursue her studies in Moscow—with the blessing of her influential adoptive father, Zhou Enlai, and Mao himself. The valuable insights she gained there during World War II, most notably the significance of characters' inner lives, would enable her to excel back in China, where she produced works by Chekhov and Gogol, and other socially progressive dramas, such as an adaptation of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Her striking career as China's first female director of modern spoken drama (Huaju) would be derailed.

In 1924 George Mallory departs on his third expedition to reach the summit of Mount Everest. Left behind in Cambridge, George's young wife, Ruth, along with the rest of a war-ravaged England, anticipates news they hope will reclaim some of the empire's faded glory. Through alternating narratives, what emerges is a beautifully rendered story of love torn apart by obsession and the need for redemption.

Flora Thompson is best known as the author of Lark Rise to Candleford, a semi-autobiographical, bestselling series exploring Oxfordshire country life in the late 19th century. Heatherley picks up the story a year after her central character, Laura, left Candleford Green, moving on to Grayshott on the Hampshire/Surrey border, and with it, finding a new world. Through Laura, the book explores Flora’s experience working in a post-office, where to her surprise her customers included the authors Arthur Conan Doyle and George Bernard Shaw.

I sentimenti, il corpo, il sesso, la gelosia, l'onore, la morte, il sangue e l'esilio... Il riscatto di Napoli attraverso la formazione di un giovane orfano che cresce alla scuola di don Gaetano, diventando testimone dei giorni della rivolta della città alla fine dell'occupazione tedesca.

Edyth, wife of King Harold of England, disappeared forever on the day of the great Battle of Hastings in 1066, taking with her the legitimate heirs to the thrones of England and Wales. This is the story of that amazing woman, who loved and married the King of Wales and then the man who would be King of England, only to witness his historic defeat by the light of Halley's Comet.

In July 1913, 25-year-old Annie Clements had seen enough of the world to know that it was unfair. She’s spent her whole life in the copper-mining town of Calumet, Michigan, where men risk their lives for meager salaries - and had barely enough to put food on the table and clothes on their backs. The women labor in the houses of the elite and send their husbands and sons deep underground each day. When Annie decides to stand up for herself and the entire town of Calumet, nearly everyone believes she may have taken on more than she is prepared to handle.

The year is 1143. Hildegard, already a well-known physician, has expanded her work to writing not just about medicine but on theological matters as well. Once again, the monks of St. Disibod are there to stop her, citing the biblical passages that admonish against "women teachers". Also, Abbot Kuno is aging, and it is only a matter of time before he is succeeded in the post by Prior Helenger, who wants nothing more than to see Hildegard permanently relegated to the convent's enclosure.

After midnight, Thelma Lorber enters her brother Abie’s hangout under the Williamsburg Bridge, finding Jewish mobster Louis “Pretty” Amberg in a puddle of blood on the kitchen floor. She could flee. Instead, in the dark hours of that October 1935 night before the dawn of Murder, Inc., she remains beside the fierce, funny brother who has protected her since childhood. There are many kinds of love a woman can feel for a man, but few compare to that of the baby sister for her older brother. For Thelma, a wild widow tethered to a young son, Abie is the center of her world.

Called the most promising artist of his generation, handsome, modest, and affectionate, Richard Dadd rubbed shoulders with the great luminaries of the Victorian Age. He grew up along the Medway with Charles Dickens and studied at the Royal Academy Schools under the brilliant and eccentric J. M. W. Turner. Based on Dadd’s tragic true story, Mad Richard follows the young artist as he develops his craft, contemplates the nature of art and fame - as he watches Dickens navigate those tricky waters - and ultimately finds himself imprisoned in Bedlam for murder, committed as criminally insane.

A vividly original literary novel based on the astounding true-life story of Laura Bridgman, the first deaf and blind person who learned language and blazed a trail for Helen Keller. At age two, Laura Bridgman lost four of her five senses to scarlet fever. At age seven, she was taken to Perkins Institute in Boston to determine if a child so terribly afflicted could be taught. At age 12, Charles Dickens declared her his prime interest for visiting America. And by age 20, she was considered the 19th century's second most famous woman.

In 1937 F. Scott Fitzgerald was a troubled, uncertain man whose literary success was long over. In poor health, with his wife consigned to a mental asylum and his finances in ruins, he struggled to make a new start as a screenwriter in Hollywood. By December of 1940, he would be dead of a heart attack. Those last three years of Fitzgerald's life, often obscured by the legend of his earlier Jazz Age glamour, are the focus of Stewart O'Nan's gorgeously and gracefully written novel.

The Little House books, which chronicled the pioneer adventures of Laura Ingalls Wilder, are among the most beloved books in the American literary canon. Lesser known is the secret, concealed for decades, of how they came to be. Now, best-selling author Susan Wittig Albert reimagines the fascinating story of Laura's daughter, Rose Wilder Lane, an intrepid world traveler and writer who returned to her parents' Ozark farm, Rocky Ridge, in 1928.

Growing up in the Depression, Tom thinks his southern Indiana life is perfect, until the day the green beans burn on the stove and he cannot find his mother. As an adult, Tom determines he will never forgive God for taking the most important person in his life. Not even the prestige of working in the White House under President Eisenhower and in the CIA under President Kennedy can ease his bitterness. Then, through an unexpected voice and an unpretentious Amish man, Tom Kirkman is forever changed.

The year 1963: Reeling from the death of her mother and President Kennedy’s assassination, Catherine Gray shows up on Elizabeth Bentley’s doorstep demanding answers to the shocking mystery she just uncovered about her family. What she doesn’t expect is for Bentley to ensnare her in her own story of becoming a controversial World War II spy and Cold War informer.

1857. Three women—once strangers—come together in unpredictable Utah Territory. Hopeful, desperate, and willful, they’ll allow nothing on Earth or in Heaven to stand in their way. Following the call of their newfound Mormon faith, Tamar Loader and her family weather a brutal pilgrimage from England to Utah, where Tamar is united with her destined husband, Thomas Ricks. Clinging to a promise for the future, she abides an unexpected surprise: Thomas is already wedded to one woman—Tabitha, a local healer—and betrothed to still another.

La extraordinaria historia de la mujer que escribió en la sombra algunas de las obras más importantes del siglo XX.

The 330s, BCE, Greece: Alexander, a handsome young warrior of Macedon, begins his quest to conquer the ancient world. But he cannot ascend to power, and keep it, without the women who help to shape his destiny. His spirited younger half-sister, Thessalonike, yearns to join her brother and see the world. Instead, it is Alexander’s boyhood companion who rides with him into war while Thessalonike remains behind. Far away, crafty Princess Drypetis will not stand idly by as Alexander topples her father from Persia’s throne.