HISTORICAL FICTION

Merlin, Medieval, & Elizabethan Ages | Primitive Lands | Frontier

American Civil War | The Great Depression | World Wars | Turbulent 60's and 70's

MERLIN, MEDIEVAL, & ELIZABETHAN AGES

• Midnight Magic by Avi-- In Italy in 1491, Mangus the magician and his apprentice are summoned to the castle of Duke Claudio to determine if his daughter is indeed being haunted by a ghost.
• Black Water by Rachel Anderson-- Albert is an epileptic who lives a cloistered life with his mother in nineteenth-century England, and while she deludes herself searching for a miracle cure, Albert eventually begins to accept his condition and to become self-reliant.
• The Shakespeare Stealer by Gary L. Blackwood-- A young orphan boy is ordered by his master to infiltrate Shakespeare's acting troupe in order to steal the script of "Hamlet," but he discovers instead the meaning of friendship and loyalty.
• King’s Shadow by Elizabeth Adler-- Evyn is a young Welsh serf whose life changes radically after an attack leaves him orphaned and mute. He eventually becomes the servant and “shadow” of Earl Harold, who became King of England during the tumultuous time of Normans and Saxons.
• The King’s Swift Rider by Mollie Hunter—The story of Scotland’s Robert the Bruce.
• Catherine Called Birdy by Karen Cushman—In medieval England, a starving and homeless orphan “Brat” becomes “Alyce” as she makes a place for herself in the world.
• Girl in a Cage by Jane Yolen & Robert Harris-- As English armies invade Scotland in 1306, eleven-year-old Princess Marjorie, daughter of the newly crowned Scottish king, Robert the Bruce, is captured by England's King Edward Longshanks and held in a cage on public display.
• Year of the Hangman by Gary L. Blackwood-- In 1777, having been kidnapped and taken forcibly from England to the American colonies, fifteen-year-old Creighton becomes part of developments in the political unrest there that may spell defeat for the patriots and change the course of history.

Back to top

PRIMITIVE LANDS

• The Ransom of Mercy Carter by Caroline Cooney-- In 1704, in the English settlement of Deerfield, Massachusetts, eleven-year-old Mercy and her family and neighbors are captured by Mohawk Indians and their French allies, and forced to march through bitter cold to French Canada, where some adapt to new lives and some still hope to be ransomed.
• The White: a novel by Deborah Larsen-- A novel based on the story of Mary Jemison, who, in 1758, was taken by a Shawnee raiding party from her home near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, describes her life among the Seneca and reveals how she became an integral part of their tribe.
• Sacajawea by Joseph Bruchac-- Sacajawea, a Shoshoni Indian interpreter, peacemaker, and guide, and William Clark alternate in describing their experiences on the Lewis and Clark Expedition to the Northwest.
• Pirates! by Celia Rees-- In 1722, after arriving with her brother at the family's Jamaican plantation where she is to be married off, sixteen-year-old Nancy Kington escapes with her slave friend, Minerva Sharpe, and together they become pirates traveling the world in search of treasure.
• Ship of Fire by Michael Cadnum--In 1587, sailing to Spain on board Sir Francis Drake's ship "Elizabeth Bonaventure," seventeen-year-old surgeon's apprentice Thomas Spyre finds that, with the sudden death of his master, he must take over as ship's surgeon and prove his skill not only as a doctor but also as a fighter when he is enlisted by Drake to face battle.

Back to top

FRONTIER

• Rodzina by Karen Cushman-- A twelve-year-old Polish American girl is boarded onto an orphan train in Chicago with fears about traveling to the West and a life of unpaid slavery.
• Prairie Whispers by Frances Arrington-- Only twelve-year-old Colleen knows that her baby sister died just after she was born and that Colleen put another baby in her place, until the baby's father shows up and makes trouble for her and her family on the South Dakota prairie in the 1860s.
• Orphan Trains Quartet by Joan Lowery Nixon—The books in this series are all about children finding new families on the famed Orphan train of America.
• The Second Bend in the River by Ann Rinaldi-- In 1798 Rebecca, a young settler in the Ohio territory, meets the Shawnee called Tecumseh and develops a deep friendship with him.
• Sunshine Rider: The First Vegetarian Western by Ric Lynden Hardman-- Wylie, a seventeen-year-old assistant cook on a cattle drive, has many adventures during which he turns vegetarian and decides to become a doctor. Includes recipes.

Back to top

AMERICAN CIVIL WAR

• North by Night by Ayres-- Presents the journal of a sixteen-year-old girl whose family operates a stop on the Underground Railroad. (book written as a diary)
• Trembling Earth by Kim L. Siegelson-- In 1864, two boys, one a slave running toward freedom and one hoping to collect the reward for capturing him, make their way through Georgia's Okefenokee Swamp, relying on knowledge the white boy's father, disabled by the war, had passed on to him in happier times.
• Steal Away Home by Lois Ruby-- In two parallel stories, a Quaker family in Kansas in the late 1850s operates a station on the Underground Railroad, while almost 150 years later twelve-year-old Dana moves into the same house and finds the skeleton of a Black woman who helped the Quakers.
• Evvy’s Civil War by Miriam Brenamen-- In Virginia in 1860, on the verge of the Civil War, fourteen-year-old Evvy chafes at the restrictions that her society places on both women and slaves.

Back to top

THE GREAT DEPRESSION

• Petey by Ben Mikaelson-- In 1922 Petey, who has cerebral palsy, is misdiagnosed as mentally retarded and institutionalized; sixty-eight years later, still in the institution, he befriends a boy and shares with him the joy of life.
• Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred Taylor-- A Black family living in the South during the 1930s is faced with prejudice and discrimination which their children don't understand. (Book 2 of The Logan Family Series)
• Bud, not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis-- Ten-year-old Bud, a motherless boy living in Flint, Michigan, during the Great Depression, escapes a bad foster home and sets out in search of the man he believes to be his father--the renowned bandleader, H.E. Calloway of Grand Rapids.
• A Long Way From Chicago by Richard Peck-- A boy recounts his annual summer trips to rural Illinois with his sister during the Great Depression to visit their larger-than-life grandmother. The story continues in A Year Down Yonder.
• Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse-- In a series of poems, fourteen-year-old Billie Jo relates the hardships of living on her family's wheat farm in Oklahoma during the dust bowl years of the Depression.

Back to top

WORLD WARS

• Don’t You Know There’s a War on ? by Avi-- In wartime Brooklyn in 1943, eleven-year-old Howie Crispers mounts a campaign to save his favorite teacher from being fired.
• Blitzcat by Robert Westall—Cats like carrier pigeons, can find their way over many miles. Lord Gort has wandered all across England during World War II to find his master.
• Code Talker by Joseph Bruchac-- After being taught in a boarding school run by whites that Navajo is a useless language, Ned Begay and other Navajo men are recruited by the Marines to become Code Talkers, sending messages during World War II in their native tongue.
• I Had Seen Castles by Cynthia Rylant-- Now an old man, John is haunted by memories of himself as an eighteen-year-old, enlisting to fight in World War II, a decision which forced him to face the horrors of war and changed his life forever.

Back to top

TURBULENT 60'S AND 70'S

• Lost in the War by Nancy Antle-- Twelve-year-old Lisa Grey struggles to cope with a mother whose traumatic experiences as a nurse in Vietnam during the war are still haunting her.
• Kira-Kira by Cynthia Kadohata-- Chronicles the close friendship between two Japanese-American sisters growing up in rural Georgia during the late 1950s and early 1960 s, and the despair when one sister becomes terminally ill.
• Before We Were Free by Julia Alvarez-- In the early 1960 s in the Dominican Republic, twelve-year-old Anita learns that her family is involved in the underground movement to end the bloody rule of the dictator, General Trujillo.
• The Stones of Mourning Creek by Diane Les Becquets-- In Alabama in the 1960 s, fourteen-year-old Francie develops a controversial and dangerous friendship with a colored girl her own age.
• The Mississippi Trial by Chris Crowe-- In Mississippi in 1955, a sixteen-year-old finds himself at odds with his grandfather over issues surrounding the kidnapping and murder of a fourteen-year-old African American from Chicago.
• Too Big a Storm by Marsha Qualey-- When serious worrier Brady Callahan meets vivacious Sally Cooper, daughter of a wealthy Minnesota family, they develop a close friendship that helps them both grow and survive during the turbulent Vietnam War era.

Back to top