Reviews by Tag: historical fiction

The Underground Railroad, by Colson Whitehead, is a creative imagining of the Civil

War. Whitehead takes the concept of the Underground Railroad, which is ironically visualized as

a real railroad that runs under America. The novel follows a young slave, Cora, after her

mother’s escape from their plantation. After years of torment and abuse, Cora and a new slave,

Caesar, escape the plantation and make their way North by underground trains. Throughout her

Liesel Meminger’s life changes after her brother dies and she moves in with a foster family.

This book covers her adventures with her best friend, her struggles and a secret she had to

keep. From the point of view of the narrator Death, Liesel experiences Germany during World

War II and steals books to read thus becoming “The Book Thief”.

Malinda Lo’s Last Night at the Telegraph Club is a touchingly

bittersweet novel about young, forbidden love in the 1950s. Lily Hu is a

Chinese American teenager living in San Francisco in the midst of the Red-

Scare panic of 1954. One day, she starts talking with her classmate, Kath

Miller, and feels a spark of true connection between them. Their

relationship starts to blossom through the course of the novel as they

The Blood of Flowers displays a young girl, unnamed and desperate for marriage

However, fate seemed to have other plans as her father injures himself and soon falls sick. Days

go by as the girl and her mother aid to her father’s sickness but it does not do well, as he falls

dead within the arms of his wife. Stricken by poverty and grief, the girl and her mother have no

choice but to reach out to her mother’s long lost brother, who was a rich carpet maker in the rich

Macbeth is a tragedy written by Shakespeare, loosely based on Scottish history. It follows

Macbeth and his wife Lady Macbeth on their trials of prophecy. The Macbeth’s deal with a

self-fulling prophesy of gaining and loosing power as foretold by the staple three witches.

Personally I believe that Macbeth is an important piece of literature. Its historical impacts and

influences made it an important piece of work at the time, and it still has reference to today. But

I’ve read Chloe Gong’s previous duology, but I wasn’t aware she was coming out with a new

book with the same setting and (roughly) same characters. After seeing multiple reviews of this

book on Goodreads and having it recommended to me by a friend, I was eager to read it.

There are spoilers for her original duology (These Violent Delights and Our Violent Ends).

I have never heard about the story of Wilhelm Gustloff. I think that this story talks about a very

important event in history that we should all know about. And this book fantastically incorporated the

story of Wilhelm Gustloff in this historical fiction novel. The author shows you such diverse, different,

characters that are so unique and love able. The book describes the tragedies that happened in one of

many of the heartbreaking events that happened in World War 2. This book rotates between several

A Thousand Splendid Suns follows the story of two women between 1960 and 2000. ese

two women have different upbringings and are from two different generations but still end up in

the same place. They endure many heartbreaking events and sufferings. However, they learn

and teach each other their ways, ultimately forming a loving relationship. Before reading this

book, I knew nothing about Afghan's history or current events. However, it opened my eyes to

The Good Earth is a classic of historical fiction over Chinese history and how it affects a farmer

named Wang Lung written by Pearl S. Buck. This book illustrates the farmer’s journey from

looking for a wife and working hard every day on the farm alongside the hardships of dry land

and poor conditions as their family struggles until they finally gain luck by earning money to

continue their farming and livelihood and continue to become richer until Wang Lung becomes a