Best Historical Fiction

  Inspired by the true story of Ann Trow Lohman, also known as Madame Restell, this is a brilliant depiction of a woman who rises from grim beginnings to the splendor of New York City as a “female physician” for roughly forty years and becoming one of the most controversial women of her time. NYC, 1860. Axie Muldoon comes from an impoverished Irish family, after being separated from her family, she is provided a roof over her head in exchange for doing household chores. It is a house belonging to the doctor and his wife. She quickly advances from household chores to assisting in the clinic set at the house, arranging the vials, following formulas, using the pill press and the scales. She is told that a specific dosage brings relief, but a bit more might turn fatal. The library at the house serves as her schoolroom where she learns details of anatomy, of afflictions and the procedures to cure them. Soon after, at fourteen, she is apprenticed as assistant to midwife. Once married, he...

 Beryl Markham (1902-1986) was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic in 1936. She was the first female horse trainer in the world, producing one of the greatest victories in the history of racing. She was a free-spirited character. She may not be someone you identify with, but she was full of passion and worth of attention. “A woman who lived by her own code instead of society’s.” Beryl is brought to Kenya as a child. But the rough kind of life isn’t meant for her mother and brother, who go back to England. Beryl stays with her father, who falls in love with the wild side of Africa. At sixteen, she is forced to start making decisions for herself as her father is moving south to Cape Town. Against her better judgement, she marries Jock, a landowner, who isn’t “afraid to dirty his hands” as her father puts it. As she suffers “an illness of the spirit,” she lifts herself up by becoming a horse trainer. Something that comes naturally to her. She also experiences more than o...

 The Collector's Daughter brings a fascinating story of Lady Evelyn Herbert, who took the very first steps into the tomb of Pharaoh Tutankhamun.  London, 1972. Eve is in her early seventies, and after another stroke she is working to regain her speech at a rehabilitation center. It’s here that she receives a visitor from Egypt - Dr. Ana Mansor. Mansor has been engaged in a research project and has found some anomalies in archives around the finds of the Tutankhamun’s tomb. The memory of the discovery gives Eve a spark and motivation for improving her speech, but there is something she doesn’t want to reveal. Luxor, 1919. Eve comes from a privileged family, a daughter of Lord Carnarvon, who funds the exploration of the Tutankhamun’s tomb. While her mother plans to marry her well, meaning to a man of certain social standing, Eve dreams of an equal partnership, a man who will share a passion for travel and who will accept her being a lady archeologist. She has been coming to Egyp...