Recommended historical fiction novels?

Gore Vidal’s Burr.

My favorite of all time, I read them over and over: The Complete Aubrey/Maturin Novels by Patrick O’Brian

When O’Brian died I wept that there would never be a new one again.

The Good Journey by Michaela Gilchrist. Also The Fiercer Heart by the same author.

I moved from Phillipa Gregory to http://www.amazon.com/Kate-Furnivall/e/B001JSF7X2/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1 Kate Furnivall

Dickens: A Tale of Two Cities
Alexander Dumas: The Three Musketeers
Victor Hugo: Hunchback of Notre Dame
Five Gold Anchors to pdworkin for for Patrick O’Brian recommendation
Pat Barker: The Regeneration Trilogy (WWI)
Bernard Cornwell; The Richard Sharpe series (set during the Napoleonic wars)
Paul Scott; The Raj Quartet

Outlander series by Diana Gabaldon (its romance with history :) )

Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett is one of the best books I’ve ever read. I love historical fiction, and this one outshone all the others. It’s an amazing, epic story, and the history interwoven with the story is pretty incredible.

I also enjoyed The Outlander series. It has a little bit of everything.

Get the series of books about Rome by Colleen McCullough. She wrote The Thorn Birds, by the way. Her time line goes from Marius and Sulla to the early reign of the Emperor Augustus. Not only does it get up close and personal, but the scholarship is top notch. She has notes at the end of every book breaking down how she researched for that book.

Historical fiction:
The Ass Saw the Angel
A Good Man is Hard to Find
Old School
Catch-22
Crazy in Alabama

Amazing non fiction:
Dark Tide: The Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919
Childhood: Biography of a Place

Phillipa Gregory just came out with a new book. The White Queen. It came out the 18th.

When I saw your question I was going to come suggest her, but you’re ahead of me! :)

James Clavell; Sho-Gun.

Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro. It’s abut how little things lead up to WWII – mostly. Really, it’s a non-love story about a butler and a maid. Damn. It’s a lot better than I’m making it sound, let’s leave it at that.
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. Seriously, it’s a great book. I found it to be very easy to read – actually, reading the Harry Potter series afterwards felt like a similar experience, nice and fluffy. Though maybe that’s just because I read it right after reading Crime and Punishment, come to think of it.

The Persian Boy by Mary Renault. It made me an Alexander the Great fan for life.

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova – the hunt for Dracula, detailed historical events, and heavily peppered with visual discriptions

Slick and the Duchess by John W. Ravage was good!

http://www.amazon.com/Slick-Duchess-Teapot-Scandal-Harding/dp/1598006703

If you liked Philippa Gregory, then you will also like Alison Weir. However, she writes both fiction and nonfiction. I very much liked The Lady Elizabeth, but I really liked Innocent Traitor (the story of Mary, Queen of Scots).

any sherlock holmes…they are all super fantastic

I like “The Known World” by Edward P. Jones

this doesn’t exactly fit, but it’s wonderful “The Professor and The Madman”, by Simon Winchestor. It’s actually not fiction, but it reads like it, and I can’t recommend it enough.

Ken Follet’s The Man From St. Petersburg is a nice historical fiction story. Neal Stephenson is probably my favorite historical fiction author, however. The Baroque Cycle and Cryptonomicon are both excellent.

Ken Follet’s Jackdaws or Code to Zero, The emperor’s physicina (forgot the author’s name)... too many to count really

I really like The Giver, and the two sequels Gathering Blue and The Messenger.

@wowy123 welcome to fluther. Lurve

How about Bernard Cornwell

I’m a big consumer of historical fiction. Here are some of my absolute favourite authors;

Susanna Gregory (both the Matthew Bartholomew Series and Chaloner series)
C J. Sansom (Matthew (again) Shardlake series)
Lindsey davis (Marcus Didius Falco series)
Ellis Peters (Cadfael series)
Caleb Carr (The Alienist and The Angel of Darkness)
Michael Jecks (Templar series)

And a few more.

And also, of course, the Flashman series by George MacDonald Fraser. How could I miss that one?!?

I love to read historical fiction especially if they involve royal women. some authors that I like are:
Judith Tarr
Alison Weir
Phillipa Gregory
I greatly enjoyed memoirs of a geisha
and older historical fiction author is jean plaidy and many of her books are being republished right now- she has written about queen victoria, many of henry VIII’s wives, Elizabeth I and many others. she gives excellent detail

I, Claudius by Robert Graves
It is a really good book if you like the history of the Roman Empire.

What period of history do you fancy?

I recently read Charles Portis’ True Grit. It is far better than either movie.

Sharon Kay Penman writes wonderful historical fiction namely The Sunne in Splendour and The Welsh Trilogy (3 books on the last of the Welsh Independent Princes) Sara Donatti wrote a series about an extended family, the Bonners, which is inspired by Hawkeye of The Last of the Mohicans fame. The first book, Into the Wild, has alot of similarities to Diana Gabaldon’s first quite simply for the fact that you cannot put it down!! You will be rushing out to buy the remaining books of the series. I have so many other suggestions but must sign off, thanks.

Reading “the eye of the needle” by Ken Follet right now. Awesome!

Jean Auel’s Children of the Earth series, set in prehistoric times. Amazingly informative series of books, about the Neanderthal times. The last book of this series is a drag and the second last one meanders its way towards repetition…but the other 4 are awesome reads. Am surprised no one has mentioned it already…