These Violent Delights is the first novel in Chloe Gong's historical fiction series of the same name. Set in 1926 Shanghai, a blood feud between two rival gangs tears the city apart until they lose control. When a contagious sickness runs rampant through Shanghai and turns the population mad, the teenage heirs of the two gangs must work together to save their city. Gong's retelling of Romeo and Juliet is unique and well-done.
Midnight at the Electric is a sci-fi/historical fiction novel that tells 3 stories of 3 young women, Adri, Catherine, and Lenore, facing difficult times in their lives as they learn about the values of friends, family, and love. One takes place in Kansas in 2065, one in Oklahoma during the Dust Bowl, and one in post-World War I England. These stories are all beautifully interweaved, but we do not learn how until the end of the book.
Our Violent Ends, by Chloe Gong, is the sequel to These Violent Delights and a continuation of the retelling of Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare. After Juliet’s supposed betrayal, Roma is on a spree of vengeance while Juliet tries to maintain her role as heir within the Scarlet Gang. But as both Gangs face blackmails that threaten to release more monsters, a collaboration of the heirs is proposed and the two back where they started.
When You and I Collide is a crossover story of historical fiction and hints of science fiction, which I thought was something that set this book apart from other World War Two Books. Winnie, the main character, is a high school girl who has strange abilities to see the alternate reality of situations every day. Her father, Dr. Schulde, is researching these “splinters” in reality for his government job, which endangers the lives of Winnie and his assistant, Scott. What Dr.
This novel follows the wartime life of young Michael O’Shaunessey, whose father is the Irish ambassador to Nazi Germany, and his mother works for the Irish Intelligence. Together, all three spy on the Nazis and secretly give the Allies intelligence on the Germans, despite the fact that Ireland is officialy neutral.
Tomi Nakaji is a young Japanese-American boy growing up on the streets of Hawai’i. All his life knows is school, fishing, his baseball team, and his friends.
So when the Japanese Empire bombs Pearl Harbor, throwing America headfirst into World War Two, the American people are looking for someone to blame. Soon, his grandfather and father are detained solely for their Japanese heritage, even though they are loyal Americans. His mother is fired from her housekeeping job because it “does not look good” to give a Japanese-American woman work.
Emma Theriault’s Rebel Rose is the first novel in The Queen’s Council series, a series of Disney princess continuations with historical fiction twists; Rebel Rose is a continuation of Beauty and the Beast. Belle must learn to be queen and navigate politics as the French Revolution divides France and her newfound kingdom. While I enjoyed how Theriault wove history into a Disney classic, I found that her characters lacked a solid resemblance to the originals on which they were based.
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, by Taylor Jenkins Reid, is a historical fiction novel set in the mid to late 1900s. The novel tells the tale of a famous Hollywood actress, Evelyn Hugo, as she narrates her story to a journalist. Evelyn Hugo is seventy-nine and has made the decision to finally open up about her mysterious and scandalous rise to fame, including the stories of her seven husbands. She chooses to tell her story to Monique Grant, a relatively unknown magazine journalist.
Khaled Hosseini's historical fiction novel A Thousand Splendid Suns tells the story of two Afghan women, belonging to different generations, from the early 1960s through the early 2000s. Both women are born in different circumstances as Mariam is the illegitimate daughter of a rich man and Laila is the daughter of a teacher. Mariam is forced to marry a shoemaker from Kabul when she is fifteen and Laila's life is turned upside down when her parents are killed.
The Song of Achilles, by Madeline Miller, belongs to the historical fiction genre and is a retelling of Homer's Iliad. When Patroclus is exiled from his home for an act of violence, he meets Achilles, the son of a sea goddess, who is destined to be the greatest Greek hero ever known. The two form a friendship despite the disapproval of Achilles' mother.
