New Reviews: Historical Fiction

This audiobook is a fictionalized sports biography about tennis prodigy Alice Marble, who became the world's top female tennis player in 1939. Gail Shalan narrates this dual-timeline story and communicates the tension of court play: the snap decisions, along with the stamina and determination it takes to be a winner. The lively, driven heroine is also a comic book creator, and... Read More

This audiobook is a gripping historical epic about Semiramis, the only female ruler of the Assyrian Empire. Ayesha Antoine's mesmerizing narration captures the raw intensity of Semiramis's journey. Born an orphan, she rises to power through intelligence, ambition, and sheer will, navigating a treacherous world of war, politics, and forbidden love. Her relationships with King... Read More

Listeners will want to turn up the thermostat when they listen to British-accented Steve West present this horrific story. A Royal Navy ship is sent to rescue survivors of the Franklin Expedition, last seen in Baffin Bay in the Arctic Ocean in 1845. Among the searchers is Lieutenant Frederick Robinson, who is intent on advancing his Navy career, and surgeon Edward Adams, a... Read More

Ell Potter delivers a smashing performance of Galland's engrossing novel. The title character is Sander Cooke, an androgynous actor with the Chamberlain's Men in Elizabethan London whose brilliant performances in female roles have made him a celebrity. His best friend, Joan, longs to study, but scholarship is forbidden because she's a woman. So Joan employs cross-dressing to... Read More

Jane Oppenheimer provides a tone of truthfulness to this historical novel highlighting the friction between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr as they seek to defend a murder suspect in 1800s America. Levi Weeks is accused of murdering Emma Sands, a lively young woman who disappeared from her boardinghouse. Lawyers Hamilton and Burr have political aspirations as each tries to... Read More

Golden Voice narrator Cassandra Campbell tells the WWII story of two childhood friends, Hilde and Hannah, whose lives converge in a "model camp" for Jews, Theresienstadt. The camp is described in Nazi propaganda as Hitler's "gift to the Jews"--however, it's actually a concentration camp with dehumanizing work, scant food, and harsh punishments. Hilde, an aspiring filmmaker and... Read More

Narrator Marni Penning performs this story of unlikely friendship and divided loyalty during the chaos of the American Civil War. Southerner Libby Steadman does all she can to keep the family gristmill going while her husband is away fighting. When she discovers a horribly injured Union soldier, she has to weigh the dangers and benefits of keeping him alive behind enemy lines.... Read More

With deft interpretations and stunning vocal control, Emily Rankin and Caroline Hewitt bring this fascinating historical mystery to life. The casting is on point, bringing enough variation to the main characters to allow easy differentiation. The story spans a century of time and three generations of women. Rankin brings the listener along as Tildy Barrows, head curator of an... Read More

Little Flower is poor but talented--and she has beautiful feet, which is unusual for a woman of low status in early-nineteenth-century China. Katharine Chin delivers a striking performance, enriching this novel's historical setting with expressive storytelling. She conveys Little Flower's coming of age at a time of great strife and intrigue in a voice that blends fragility and... Read More

Canadian author James Arnett's historical fiction tells a little-known chapter of America's first civil war, the Revolutionary War. Simon Vance narrates with the gravitas of a history professor, highlighting the motivations and humanity of two Loyalist farmers, Richard Lippincott and James Moody. Lippincott, a Quaker, is trying to live a peaceful life amid the guerrilla... Read More

A new contribution to the exciting stories of women who fought against the Third Reich, this audiobook is narrated by Gilli Messer with excellence. Providing various accents and voices, Messer brings honesty and insight to the story's characters. Elena Bruskina is a young Jewish woman who becomes a sniper for the Soviet Union after seeing her family murdered in the Minsk... Read More

Period music provides an apt background for a note in the initial credits informing listeners that the pronunciation in this production will be performed in the Early Modern English of Shakespeare's time. That sets up an immersive transition to the world of 61-year-old Judith, apothecary, midwife, and the last of the Bard's progeny, who must leave town after being accused of... Read More

This thrill ride of an audiobook tells the many stories of those onboard Train 721, which crashes in Montparnasse station in October 1895. British narrator Justin Avoth narrates the drama at a good pace and keeps the story moving. Donoghue brings her plotting skills, eloquent style, and eye for social mores to the cast of fictional people who are on the train. To the group she... Read More

Narrator Emma Gregory takes on this complex story of revenge, defeat, and political intrigue, set in 1685 Dorset, England. Charles II's illegitimate son, the Protestant Duke of Monmouth, arrives in Dorset to incite rebellion against his Catholic uncle, James II, only to experience defeat and beheading. The Duke of Granville and his mother, Lady Jayne Harrier, secret allies of... Read More

Marc Cashman narrates this historical novel with the authoritative, dispassionate voice of a news commentator. Listeners follow the early naval career of Scott Bradley James, an ambitious, patriotic young man from Florida who graduates from the Naval Academy in 1941 and is soon drawn into WWII. This well-researched, personalized, and highly dramatic story follows Scott's career... Read More