New Reviews: Historical Fiction

Joanne Froggatt, of "Downton Abbey," skillfully narrates this sweeping story of art, beauty, love, and murder. The story of Birchwood Manor and its various inhabitants unfolds over the course of 150 years--from the fateful summer of 1862 to the current time. Model Birdie and archivist Elodie are the lynchpin voices, but the cast of characters is vast. Froggatt's precise diction... Read More

This Southern gothic story "begins with a house, and it ends in ashes." Kirby Heyborne delivers the narrative in a voice as straightforward as a newscaster's, recounting even the most disturbing events without judgment. At the same time, he breathes life into the characters through their dialogue, shining a light on a uniquely Southern way of life that is fading away. Diana,... Read More

Narrator Emily Woo Zeller provides a masterful storytelling experience as she takes listeners from the wilds of China to the hustle and bustle of WWII-era Los Angeles. This coming-of-age story is also lushly written historical fiction with inspirational elements. Genie Baker is forced to flee from the only home and family she's ever known to the other side of the world in order... Read More

Take one historical mystery written by three bestselling authors about three strong women, add secrets, forgery, romance, spies, and a doomed ship, then top it with three superb narrators, and you have a most satisfying audiobook. Narrators Brittany Pressley, Vanessa Johansson, and Saskia Maarleveld deliver captivating performances of the three heroines. Pressley's Caroline is... Read More

Narrator Nancy Peterson beautifully brings this sweet historical novel to life. In 1938 in Austria, young Max Dornbach and Annika Knopf agree to hide their Jewish friends' treasures from marauding Nazis. Eighty years later, Callie Randall discovers an antique copy of BAMBI with an unusual inscription in the children's bookstore she owns with her sister. As Peterson narrates... Read More

Will audiobook listeners enjoy a historical novel about Henry VIII's least interesting queen, the generally perceived to be mousy, insipid Jane Seymour? They certainly will when Alison Weir is the writer and Rosalyn Landor the narrator. Weir's meticulously researched and dramatically written portrayal of Jane is compelling, and Landor makes the myriad Tudor characters come... Read More

Narrator Shamaan Casey paints a vivid picture of life in the Colonies from the viewpoint of everyday people before the start of the American Revolution. Listeners will meet the Harris family, hardworking Quakers who use "thee" and "thou" to address everyone. Casey's talent guarantees that the speech of each character flows naturally. Adding to the verisimilitude of the setting... Read More

Narrator Jayne Entwistle's youthful voice sounds just right in her portrayal of Madame Tussaud, who started life as Anne Marie Grosholtz. Written as a memoir, or diary, the story of Tussaud's life begins when she is an orphaned child who learns about making wax casts from a Swiss doctor and continues with their sojourn in Paris, where she works with the sister of King Louis XI... Read More

Set in sixth-century Scotland, Pike's debut novel is the first of a planned trilogy exploring the Arthurian legend. The story is told from the point-of-view of Languoreth, a historical figure and twin sister of Lailoken, the man who inspired the Merlin legend. Narrator Toni Frutin does equally well with female and male characters, imbuing them with the strength to survive the... Read More

Cassandra Campbell's expert narration brings this wonderful piece of historical fiction to life. It's the story of two women, working decades apart in the Grand Central Terminal, who are passionate about art. Claire, a fashion illustrator, is an instructor at the Grand Central Art School in 1928. Fifty years later, Virginia is a divorcée working at the information booth at... Read More

Nancy Wu is an excellent choice to narrate this historical novel about young Mei Ling, a Chinese girl who moves to America to be the wife of a man, sight unseen. Wu's style is sensitive, precise, and steady. We are transported back to the early twentieth century, guided by Wu's emotional performance. From Mei Ling's painful separation, to her perilous journey via boat, through... Read More

This audiobook is a love story set against the backdrop of the Cuban Revolution. Narrators Frankie Corzo, Thom Rivera, and Timothy Andrés Pabon present the personal and political as the country moves towards communism. Corzo gives a dreamy and throaty voice to Carmela, a female freedom fighter and budding beauty. We follow Carmela through her various missions, experiencing the... Read More

With a soft Texas drawl, Susan Bennett inhabits Bonnie Parker, who tells the story of her and Clyde's infamous descent into robbery and murder in the 1930s. SIDE BY SIDE picks up where BECOMING BONNIE (also narrated by Bennett) ends, with Clyde's release from a prison work camp so horrific that he vows to never be captured alive. Bennett also beautifully projects the... Read More

This extraordinary collaboration between the Booker Prize-winning novelist Pat Barker and superb narrators Kristin Atherton and Michael Fox reimagines the passionate, bloody, mythic Trojan War of Homer's ILIAD. Once begun, you will want to abandon everything to spend time with Fox's "Great" Achilles (aka The Butcher) and Atherton's Briseis, a Trojan queen become his bed-slave.... Read More

This engaging audiobook demonstrates that, despite the passage of nearly two generations, new Holocaust stories continue to emerge. Richard Armitage is a superb narrator whose performance here is among his best. Heather Morris bases her book on the story of Holocaust survivor Ludwig Sokolov, who was taken to Auschwitz and given the job of tattooing numbers on every prisoner.... Read More

Learning about the Vanderbilt family in the closing years of the nineteenth century through this audiobook seems far more fulfilling and unconflicted than being married into it. Fowler, best known for Z: A NOVEL OF ZELDA FITZGERALD, is in full command of the history, manners, and social structure of the era, and in Barrie Kreinik she has a narrator of particular skill and... Read More

Laurence Dobiesz's steady, unaffected narration brings precision, dexterity, and conviction to a story built on meticulous detailing. As narrator, he is clearly at home in several European languages and is capable of suggesting a character or a state of mind with a shift in volume or tone. Set in the Carpathians, in a makeshift hospital on the Austro-Russian front in WWI,... Read More