10 New Historical Fiction Books Hitting the Shelves

We’re kicking things off with a beautiful yet heartbreaking story centered around Partition — or the separation of India and Pakistan. The Book of Everlasting Things follows a perfumer’s apprentice named Samir Vij and a calligrapher’s apprentice named Firdaus Khan. They meet at Samir’s family’s perfumery, and over the next years they fall in love with their crafts and each other. But when their country is split by Partition, the two lovers find themselves on opposite sides, making their love forbidden. As the years pass and their paths stray more and more from each other, Samir and Firdaus must decide if it’s time to let go.

This WWII historical fiction is particularly interesting because its story was inspired by a real-life spy! Set in Rome in 1944, The Lipstick Bureau follows Niki Novotná. She just married an American and is recruited by the U.S. as a spy. Her task? To create fake propaganda to lower the enemies’ morale with the help of the rest of The Lipstick Bureau. Niki is good at what she does, but soon she starts to question her instructions — and things become more dangerous for her when she falls for one of her colleagues. 

Now we’re traveling back to 1800s Canada with Kai Thomas’s In the Upper Country! The story is set in Dunmore, a town settled by people escaping from enslavement. That’s where our protagonist, Lensinda Martin, works for a Black journalist. One day, a woman fresh off the Underground Railroad shoots a slave hunter. She refuses to leave before the authorities arrive, so Lensinda is tasked with interviewing her. The old woman will tell her story, if Lensinda shares one of her own. Thus begins an incredible exchange that reveals an interconnected history of love and survival for the Black and Indigenous peoples of North America.

Moonrise Over New Jessup begins when our main character Alice Young arrives at the all-Black town of New Jessup, Alabama. It is 1957, and the residents of New Jessup have rejected integration in favor of advancing and fortifying their community. Alice loves New Jessup, but she also loves a man named Raymond Campbell. He organizes clandestine activities that challenge the town’s status quo. If discovered, the couple could be thrown out — or worse. Which means Alice will have to balance her desire to help her partner with her need to protect her beloved town.

The next book takes us to 1950s Philadelphia, to the lives of two women named Ruby and Eleanor. The former will be the first in her family to attend college, if her taboo love affair doesn’t pull her back into poverty. The latter is attending Howard University in Washington, D.C. There, she meets the handsome William Pride and falls in love. But his elite family won’t accept her, and all Eleanor wants is to fit in. The lives of Ruby and Eleanor will intersect. The question is, how?

Skull Water is an intergenerational historical fiction novel set in South Korea. The story mainly follows a boy named Insu. He’s the son of a Korean woman and a U.S. Army man. Throughout the story, we get to see him grow up in the army base with his other “half and half” friends. His life is forever changed when he hears of a way to heal his Big Uncle’s mysterious injury — which sends him on a journey to some of the country’s darkest corners.

This new historical fiction is a sweeping story about generational trauma, family, religion, and historical violence. Set in 1940s Trinidad, Hungry Ghosts follows two very different families. The Changoors own a luxurious farm, while the Saroops live in the tin and wood Barracks down below. When Dalton Changoor goes missing, Hans Saroop sees this as an opportunity to earn more money and move his family to a better home. So he takes it upon himself to find the wealthy landowner. But things are not as they seem, and the deeper he digs, the more entwined the Changoors’ and the Saroops’ lives become.

One of the best things about this book is that it sheds some light on the little-known history of the thousands of Chinese workers who were taken to Europe as laborers during WWI. The Porcelain Moon is set in 1918 France, and it follows a woman named Pauline Deng. She flees her home to escape an arranged marriage, going to her cousin Theo for help. He works in the Chinese Labour Corps in the countryside, which would help Pauline hide from her father. Ultimately, a woman named Camille is the one who offers her home to Pauline. The two quickly become friends, but it soon becomes clear that Camille is hiding something — and her secret could be deadly for both of them.

Dust Child begins in 1969, when Trang and her sister run away to Sài Gòn to make money as bar girls in order to help their parents pay off their debts. That’s where Trang meets an American pilot named Dan, and an irresistible romance blooms between them. Years later, Dan is back in Việt Nam with his wife Linda, trying to face his violent past. At the same time, a man named Phong is trying to find his parents and leave the country. He’s the son of a Black American soldier and a Vietnamese woman, which has caused his neighbors to resent him and call him the derogatory title “dust child.” As past and present collide, all these characters will have to face their trauma and the decisions that came out of it.

Last but not least, this list wouldn’t be complete without Victor LaValle’s historical horror! Lone Women is the story of Adelaide Henry, a woman with a terrible secret that killed her parents and forced her to flee her home carrying a mysterious trunk. She’s now trying to bury her past and settle in an empty plot of land in Montana — which she can keep if she manages to cultivate it. Women like her are called “lone women” by the state. Except Adelaide is most definitely not alone, and her secret won’t stay hidden for long.