We Go Way Back: 25 of the Best Historical Fiction Books of the Past 10 Years

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson

A young pistillate named Ursula Todd is calved successful 1910 and lives her beingness successful England. Sounds elemental enough, right? Except 1 mentation of Ursula dies astatine childbirth; different lone lives a fewer years longer than that; 1 goes connected to assistance with warfare effort during World War II. These are aggregate versions of the beingness of Ursula Todd, each woven unneurotic successful this compelling Costa Book Award–winning novel.

The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

In this Booker Prize winner, it’s 1866 successful New Zealand. A antheral named Walter Moody is hoping to onslaught it affluent during New Zealand’s booming golden rush. Instead, helium encounters a radical of men connected a acheronian and stormy nighttime who archer him a communicative that volition alteration the people of his life.

The Water Dancer by Ta-Nehisi Coates

This archetypal caller by National Book Award–winning Coates was an Oprah Book Club pick, a #1 New York Times bestseller, and more. It’s astir a young enslaved antheral named Hiram who harnesses a mysterious powerfulness that saves him erstwhile helium astir drowns. It is this lawsuit that pushes Hiram to flight his beingness of bondage and rescue his family.

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Trust by Hernan Diaz

Nominated for the Booker Prize, and victor of The Kirkus Prize, this is Pulitzer Prize–winner Diaz’s caller wrong a memoir, wrong a novel…It’s the 1920s, and decadent tycoon Benjamin Trask and his woman Helen negociate to flight the ruin caused by Black Friday. But they don’t request to worry, due to the fact that they’re not real: they’re characters successful a bestselling book. But they are based connected existent people, 1 of whom has written what they see the truth. But is that the existent story? This is simply a wonderful, layered delight.

At Night All Blood is Black by David Diop, Translated by Anna Moschovakis

A young Senegalese man’s enactment arsenic a worker successful the French service during World War I leads to trauma and heightened violence, arsenic helium starts a disturbing ritual each nighttime connected the battlefield. This was the 2021 International Booker Prize winner, arsenic good arsenic the victor of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for fiction, and 1 of Barack Obama’s favourite books of 2021.

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

Now 1 of the astir well-known novels acceptable during World War II, this caller won the Pulitzer Prize for fabrication successful 2013. It’s astir the destinies of a unsighted French miss and a German lad trying to past successful occupied France.

Washington Black by Esi Edugyan

An enslaved lad connected a Barbados sweetener plantation is chosen to beryllium the manservant for his master’s brother, an abolitionist, and their travels instrumentality them connected adventures astir the globe. This won the 2018 Scotiabank Giller Prize, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize, among different accolades.

The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich

This Pulitzer Prize–winning caller is based connected the beingness of Erdrich’s grandfather. It’s astir a nighttime information defender astatine a jewel bearing plant, arsenic good arsenic different members of a Chippewa assemblage successful 1950s North Dakota, and a caller “emancipation” measure astir to beryllium presented to the United States Congress.

The Narrow Road to the Deep North by Richard Flanagan

This is simply a brutal and almighty introspection of war. It’s astir an Australian surgeon successful a Japanese POW camp, his chap prisoners, the Japanese guards, and a missive that changes everything for him. This was a Man Booker Prize recipient.

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

This is considered 1 of the astir almighty debut works of humanities fiction. It’s the communicative of 2 sisters, 1 an enslaved woman, and 1 joined to an Englishman who lives successful a castle, and the communicative of the generations of their household to come. This was 1 of Oprah’s Best Books of the Year and a PEN/Hemingway Award winner.

A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James

James revisits the 1976 onslaught successful vocalist Bob Marley’s location by equipped gunman conscionable earlier the Jamaican wide election, and examines the country, its authorities and its people, astatine that time. This searing caller won the Man Booker Prize.

The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois by Honoree Fanonne Jeffers

The database of nominations and awards this caller received is astir arsenic agelong arsenic the publication itself, which is simply a hefty 816 pages! It is simply a look astatine racism, slavery, and intergenerational trauma successful America, arsenic told done the communicative of a young Black pistillate named Ailey Pearl Garfield.

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

A young Korean woman, large aft an matter with a joined man, marries a curate and moves to Japan, wherever she is met with racism and hardship that volition impact generations to come. This unthinkable caller was nominated for the National Book Award for fiction, among different awards, and was precocious made into a constricted bid for Apple TV+.

The Sleeping Car Porter by Suzette Mayr

In this victor of the 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prize, a queer Black sleeping car porter indispensable woody with ghosts of the past and contiguous erstwhile a mudslide strands the bid for a fewer days during a journey.

The Good Lord Bird by James McBride

A young enslaved Black lad successful Kansas runs distant with abolitionist John Brown, whose travels and fights volition travel to a caput astatine Harper’s Ferry successful 1859. This was a victor of the National Book Award for Fiction, and a constricted bid connected Showtime.

Circe by Madeline Miller

This is simply a retelling of the communicative of Circe successful The Odyssey, successful which she is not a vengeful witch, but a young pistillate wronged by those astir her and sent distant for being different. This publication was a bestseller and chosen arsenic a champion publication of the twelvemonth by galore publications, and it precocious returned to the bestseller database erstwhile Miller’s archetypal book, The Song of Achilles, went viral connected TikTok.

The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

Set successful the 1970s, a half-French, half-Vietnamese service skipper moves to Los Angeles aft the autumn of Saigon, and spies connected different Vietnamese refugees for the communist superiors backmost successful Vietnam. This caller won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, the 2016 Edgar Award for Best First Novel, the 2016 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence successful Fiction, and is being made into a constricted series. It besides has a sequel: The Committed.

Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell

If you deliberation Hamnet sounds similar Hamlet, that’s nary coincidence. This is simply a fictional relationship of Shakespeare’s wife, and their young son, Hamnet, who died astatine property 11. It won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction Won, the Women’s Prize for Fiction, and the Dalkey Literary Awards’s Novel of the Year. O’Farrell’s astir caller caller is different astonishing enactment of humanities fiction: The Marriage Portrait.

The Alice Network by Kate Quinn

And Kate Quinn is included present due to the fact that her works of humanities fabrication are repeated New York Times bestsellers and Goodreads Choice Award nominees. One of her astir highly reviewed works connected Goodreads is this novel, the communicative of a pistillate spy during World War I and her socialite relative searching for her galore years later.

Fruit of the Drunken Tree by Ingrid Rojas Contreras

Loosely based connected the author’s ain experiences, Fruit of the Drunken Tree is a almighty debut caller astir 2 young women surviving precise antithetic lives successful Bogotá during the reign of Pablo Escobar’s terror. It was was the metallic medal victor successful First Fiction from the California Book Awards, and a New York Times editor’s choice.

Do Not Say We Have Nothing by Madeleine Thien

This publication was a victor of the Scotiabank Giller Prize and the Governor General’s Literary Award, and a finalist for the Man Booker Prize and the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction. It’s astir 2 young women, Marie and Ai-Ming, who unrecorded successful Vancouver, looking to larn astir the lives of their household members who remained successful China.

The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk, Translated by Jennifer Croft

Tokarczuk was the 2018 recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature. Her astir caller novel, which was longlisted for the National Book Award for Translated Literature, is astir the emergence and autumn of a mysterious, charismatic spiritual person successful 18th period Europe.

A Gentleman successful Moscow by Amor Towles

In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is ordered by a tribunal to stay nether location apprehension successful a edifice crossed from the Kremlin for the remainder of his life. There, helium is witnesser to the state and its changes extracurricular his window. This caller has sold implicit 2 cardinal copies and is soon to beryllium a constricted bid starring Ewan McGregor.

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

This communicative of an enslaved pistillate trying to flight successful a literal underground railroad is 1 of the astir wide acclaimed novels of the 21st century. It won the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, and was made into a constricted bid by Barry Jenkins. (Another of Whitehead’s astonishing humanities novels, The Nickel Boys, besides won a Pulitzer.)

How Much of These Hills Is Gold by C Pam Zhang

This singular debut was longlisted for the Book Prize, a finalist for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize, 1 of Barack Obama’s favourite books of 2020, and more! It’s the communicative of 2 orphaned children of Chinese immigrants during the golden unreserved of the American West, who acceptable retired connected a travel to hide their father.