Essential Historical Fiction Books for Your Fall Reading List

Behind the velvet curtains of horse-drawn carriages and amid the soft glow of the gaslights are the detectives and bobbies sniffing out the safecrackers and petty purloiners who plague everything from the soot-covered side streets of London to the opulent manors of the countryside. With his latest title in the Big Book series, Otto Penzler is cracking cases and serving up the most thrilling, suspenseful Victorian mysteries.

New York Times bestselling author Diana Gabaldon returns with the newest novel in the epic Outlander series. Jamie Fraser and Claire Randall were torn apart by the Jacobite Rising in 1746, and it took them twenty years to find each other again. Now the American Revolution threatens to do the same. But this time Jamie and Clare have more at stake than ever before.

A remarkable novel about J. P. Morgan’s personal librarian, Belle da Costa Greene, the Black American woman who was forced to hide her true identity and pass as white in order to leave a lasting legacy that enriched our nation.

An achingly beautiful work of historical fiction that moves between Germany on the eve of World War II and present-day Wisconsin, unspooling a thread of love, longing, and the powerful bonds of family.

It was a love so strong, a king renounced his kingdom—all for that woman. Or was she just an escape route for a monarch who never wanted to rule? Bestselling author Wendy Holden takes an intimate look at the most dramatic royal scandal of the twentieth century.

From the bestselling author of Mexican Gothic comes an edgy, simmering historical novel for lovers of smoky noirs and anti-heroes. The novel follows a daydreaming secretary, a lonesome enforcer, and the mystery of a missing woman they’re both desperate to find.

A daring and timely feminist retelling of The Iliad from the perspective of the women of Troy who endured it—an extraordinary follow-up to The Silence of the Girls from the Booker Prize-winning author of The Regeneration Trilogy.

The bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow and Rules of Civility and master of absorbing, sophisticated fiction returns with a stylish and propulsive novel set in 1950s America.

A gripping, atmospheric thriller based on a true story about anarchy and assassination in Edwardian London, and one detective’s mission to preserve the life of his king and prevent a bloody war in Europe.

Her voice made her a riverboat’s darling—and its prisoner. Now she’s singing her way to freedom in this powerful novel. Uplifting, inspiring, and grounded in biblical truth, Freedom’s Song is a story for every reader who has longed for physical, emotional, or spiritual delivery.

A sweeping and shattering epic of historical fiction fueled by shocking true events, the tale of a love triangle that unfolds in the heart of Rome…in the creeping shadow of fascism. This moving novel will be forever etched in the hearts and minds of readers.