historical fiction

Red River Rose

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by Carole Lindstrom
First sentence: “‘Hurry up, Delia, I want to stop at the ferry on the way,’ said Rose, trying not to tug her sister’s arm too hard.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: March 17, 2026
Review copy provided by the publisher.R

Rose is a Métis girl living her beset life in Batoche, Saskatchewan in 1885. She helps take care of her sister, she goes hunting with her father and uncle, she enjoys watching the ferry on the river. However, one day, she overhears the elders talking about how the Canadian government want to come take their land – and that they should resist. Rose agrees: she doesn’t want to lose the only home she’s ever known, but as a 12-year-old girl, how can she help her people stand up against the government?

In the author’s note at the end, Lindstrom mentions that she wanted this to be a Native Little House on the Prairie, and I think she succeeded. It has the same quiet tone, an engaging and relatable heroine, and an insight into what life might have been like for the Métis in 1885. It was a bit simplistic (but it’s for kids!), but overall, I loved the storyline, I loved how Rose wanted to help her family and her neighbors, and I admired her willingness to take chances. Lindstrom created a great heroine, and I would love to experience more of her story.

It’s an important book – there always needs to be more stories of historical events from the Native perspective – but it’s also a good one.

Wolf Worm

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by T. Kingfisher
First sentence: “The rail station was very new, the paint still bright on the lettering that read Siler Station.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: March 24, 2026
Review copy provided by the publisher.
Content: There are some pretty gross moments, so it’s not for the squeamish stomach. I will be in the Horror section of the bookstore.

Sonia Wilson is a naturalist and an artist, but since it’s 1880 and she doesn’t have a husband, and her father recently passed, she doesn’t have many options for work. She grew tired of teaching at a girls’ boarding school, and so when a job opened up in rural western North Carolina with a naturalist looking for an artist to complete his book, she took the job. What she got, however, was much more than she bargained for.

(Read: There’s something very creepy going on in the woods.)

I don’t read horror. I don’t like being creeped out, I don’t like being grossed out. And yet, I adore Kingfisher. I haven’t read any of her horror before (maybe I will after this one), but when this one came across my desk, I couldn’t say no.

On the one hand, it was very creepy, and VERY gross. A lot of that gross was natural grossness; if you are made squeamish by bugs, this may not be for you. But it did get pretty disgusting. On the other hand, Kingfisher (like always) gave us a heroine who was smart, practical, independent, and a critical thinker. Sure, she was probably too curious for her own good, but she was a delight. And it was shot through with Kingfisher’s wit and the way she is able to create a sense of place. It’s not a delightful read, but it is a compelling one.

Just don’t read it at night.

Audiobook: The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, Volume 1

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by Beth Brower
Read by Genevieve Gaunt
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: It’s just charming; there’s nothing untoward. It’s in the Fiction section of the bookstore.

It’s 1883 and Emma M. Lion is back at Lapis Lazuli (I hope that’s spelled right; I don’t have the book to check!), the house she has rightfully inherited but that her cousin (by marriage) currently occupies. She’s escaped being the companion of her cousin’s sister for the past three years, and as she’s almost at her majority, is starting to find her way again. Of course, it’s not easy: she’s being pressed into helping her actual cousin (her father’s sister’s daughter) go on the marriage market, which she’s not looking forward to. And it doesn’t help that both of her parents have passed, and her cousin has spent nearly all of her inheritance (on clothes!). How will she make do?

I’ve seen people reading this on Bookstagram, and they’ve become obsessed. I probably would have let it pass me by except an old blogging friend of mine bullied me (well, she put it on hold at the library on Libby where we share a card, and said, You will read this) into listening to it. And, I have to say: I’m obsessed. Immediately upon finishing it, I put all eight volumes on order at the store, and I’m planning on plowing through them all. They are a delight. The narrator for this one is a delight. It’s exactly what I needed when I needed. It made me utterly happy. It’s absolutely worth the obsession.

If you haven’t read them yet, hunt them down and read them. It’s absolutely worth it.

Audiobook: Graciela in the Abyss

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by Meg Medina
Read by Elena Rey
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There are some pretty intense and scary moments, as well as emotional abuse by parents. It’s in the Middle Grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore.

Graciela accidentally died in the sea a long time ago, and woke up to be a ghost. She’s pretty content living her life until a series of things happen: her spirit guide, Amina, gets called to be a part of the ocean’s governing body; a spirit-killing harpoon gets unleashed (by accident) by a boy named Jorge; and then Graciela and Jorge have to destory the harpoon and save the sea.

Kind of. I think? The plot for this one kind of is immaterial – it’s all about Graciela’s growth. She starts the book selfish and annoying, and by the end she’s a decent human being. (At least, by the end I didn’t want to smack her as much.) Jorge was an abused child who just wanted to make things right. It’s a lot for a middle grade book.

And I had to move the narration up to 1.3x becuase it was sooooo slow at a slower speed. Like mind-numbingly slow.

I wish I had better things to say. I respect Medina and I’ve liked her books up to this point, but this one just didn’t do it for me.

The Listeners

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by Maggie Stiefvater
First sentence: “The day the hotel changed forever began as any other.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is some fade to black sex and actual Nazis. It’s in the Adult Fiction section of the bookstore.

June Hudson has worked at the Avalon Hotel – a luxury hotel in the mountains of West Virginia – since her mother abandoned her at age 10. She worked her way up from maid to general manager, earning the trust of the owners, the Gilfoyle family, and the staff. It helps that she knows how to keep the sweetwater – the water that runs through everything at the Avalon – from turning. But, it’s January 1942, and June has found that her hotel has been commendeered by the State Department to house diplomats from Germany, Italy, Japan, and Hungary while they figure out an exchange with those countries. The sweetwater feeds on emotions, and tensions are high as the diplomats crash. But, what can June do to keep these people – guests she didn’t want – happy, and keep the water from turning, and still keep the Avalon the Avalon. Because one thing is for sure: nothing will ever be the same.

I wrote a teaser review seven months ago when I first read it, and my opinion hasn’t changed much. It’s a delight to read. I adore the way Maggie writes characters, and June (and Tucker Minnick, the FBI agent) are no exception. She also has a way of creating a place that comes to life; I could see and hear and feel the Avalon around me. I liked that the stakes were high, but nothing was unreasonable. It all made sense in the context of the book. It was as much of a delight to read this time around as it was the first.

Absolutely one of her best.

Audiobook: Deep Dark

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by Zohra Nabi
Read by Sarah Ovens
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Or listen at Libro.fm
Content: There are some intense parts, jump scares, and neglectful/bad parenting. It would be in the Middle Grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore if it existed in physical form.

Cassia Thorne has spent half of her life in a debtor’s prison in London, eking out what living she could while her father slowly descended into madness. She has made her way as a flute player at the Bartholomew Fair, but this year, she has hopes of something grander: to write and sell the songs that everyone sings. But, her quest for a grander life is waylaid when her friend’s younger brother goes missing. And suddenly Cassia is thrust into the underworld of London, a world of monsters and greedy men, a world where poor children go missing solely because no one will think to go looking for them.

Can Cassia help before it’s too late?

I pitched this one to my coworkers as Dickens with a kraken, and they all agreed: who wouldn’t want to read that? I do have to admit, I was a little disappointed there was an actual monster; I was kind of hoping for a straight-up historical mystery. That said, Nabi did a fantastic job weaving both the speculative aspect of an actual monster in the tunnels under London with the historical elements of class and the way poor people had to scrape to make it.

Ovens was a fantastic narrator, though, keeping the story moving forward, and keeping me engaged enough to keep wanting to listen. I’m sad there isn’t a physical publication of the book in the US; I can think of a handful of kids who would love this one.

But it’s fantastic on audio.

Audiobook: Emily Wilde’s Compendium of Lost Tales

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by Heather Fawcett
Read by Ell Potter & Michael Dodds
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Or listen at Libro.fm
Others in the series: Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries, Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands
Content: There are some intense moments and a bit of faerie violence. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

Spoilers for the first two, obviously.

Emily and Wendell have returned to Wendell’s kingdom, the Silver Loopie, for him to take his place as ruler. It’s not all fun and games, because the former queen, Wendell’s stepmother, isn’t quite dead yet and has put a curse on the land poisoning it. It’s up to Emily, and her immense knowledge of fairy stories, to figure out which story this is playing out as, and how to set the Silver Loopie to rights. And, maybe somewhere along the way, she will figure out how to be the queen of a faerie realm.

I probably guessed somewhere along the way, that this was going to be the end of Emily and Wendell’s adventures, and while I’m sad to see them go, I love the way Fawcett wrapped them up. It had everything I have come to adore about these books: faerie magic, a bit of tension between Emily and Wendell, her dog Shadow (love the dog!), and adventures that she approaches scholarly. It was as charming and as wonderful as the other two.

I do have to admit that I got an advance copy of this book, and tried to read it but couldn’t connect with it. It wasn’t until I picked it up in audio and started listening that I realized that these books, while charming and delightful on their own, are made for audio. Potter does such as wonderful job capturing Emily’s voice and mannerisms, that she makes Emily just jump off the page. They are truly delightful as audiobooks

And, to be honest, I’m okay with the series ending. What I would like, though, is a spin-off series featuring Emily’s niece Ariadnae (not sure of the spelling of that one!). That would be delightful.

A thoroughly charming ending to a thoroughly charming series.

The Hedgewitch of Foxhall

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by Anna Bright
First sentence: “I was seven years old when I met wild magic.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There is some violence, including talk of violence done to women. And there is a slight romance. It’s in the Teen (grades 9+) section of the bookstore.

Ffion is a hedgewitch in a remote village in Wales; she lives off the earth and people’s goodness, because she shuns the ways of the Foxhall coven, which she thinks has gotten too big and powerful, and neglects the needs of the poor and downtrodden. And when her familiar, Cadno the fox, gets caught in one of the Foxhall’s sacrifices for a spell, Ffion is livid. Livid enough to team up with Prince Tal, who arrived at the coven asking for their help to do his father’s bidding – destroy the wall that they believe is hindering Welsh magic. Tal has his own reasons to be there: he and his half-brother Dafydd, are in a competition to win the throne after their father, the king, is foretold his death by his court magician. Whoever can bring magic back will be the next king.

It’s obviously not quite as simple as all that, but that’s the basic gist. What I kept thinking though, is that it felt so much like Diana Wynne Jones’s early work, full of lore and mythology and Welsh magic and grounded in nature and the mystical. This one has an elegance about it that pulled me in and kept me reading. I loved Ffion as a character, and I liked the way Bright wove magic and folklore through the book. I liked the tension between Tal and Dafydd, and have to admit that Bright surprised me with the direction the book takes. It’s not what I expected at all.

And I simply loved it.

The Listeners

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by Maggie Stiefvater
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: June 3, 2025
Review copy provided by the publisher.
Content: There is some fade-to-black sex and talk of Nazis. It will be in the Adult Fiction section of the bookstore.

The story goes like this: Maggie announces that she’s got a book out in June, that it’s published by Viking. She then posts, saying (much more Maggie-like) that she announced too early. But, by this time, I figured out that Viking is published under Penguin, and I emailed our Penguin rep asking if there are ARCs and if can I have one. He emailed back saying that it was super early, and maybe… though later, when I saw him in person, he admitted I caught him off-guard because he had no idea about the book. At any rate, her editors were looking for people to read early manuscript copies, and he gave them my name. Eventually (a month after he told me all this!), the book came in the mail to the owner, who then asked if I wanted it. I had a fangirl moment “Ohmygod, ohmyGod, OHMYGOD, YES!” (she laughed at me) and then took it home and read it practically in one night.

This won’t be a real review; I will want to read it again when it comes out, to get more out of it, to enjoy the cover (that’s just a placeholder there), and to write a real review. But know this: if you like Maggie’s work, you will like this one. The magic is subtler than in her other books, but it’s all very much Maggie. And the characters are so fascinating, so complex. And there are so many little turns of phrase that just melted my heart and caught my fancy. It’s going to be a good one.

I can’t wait for others to get to read it!

The Night War

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by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley
First sentence: “I could hear sirens.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There are intense moments, including a round-up of Jews to go to concentration camps. It’s in the Middle Grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore.

Miri and her parents are living in Nazi-occupied Paris in 1942, after fleeing Germany after the kristalnacht. They’re making do in a small apartment, but they have Jewish neighbors and it’s working. That is, until the French police raid the neighborhood and round all the Jews in France up. Miri escapes with her neighbor’s 2-year-old daughter, Nora, and after finding refuge in a nunnery (the nun saved her from an interaction with a Nazi soldier), she is separated from Nora and sent to a Catholic school in the French countryside. She has to pretend to be a Catholic, which is hard. The only bright side is that she’s close to the Vichy border, and escape. Can she find Nora and get across before she is found out?

On the one hand: this is a well-written book. (I have issues with the ghost, but aside from that.) Bradley knows how to pace a story and knows how to make a historical story relatable (in this one: all religions are valid, we shouldn’t be afraid of those who are not like us, we shouldn’t believe the propaganda we hear). However, I am just so tired of World War II books. I just am. I know these stories need to be told, but I am so so very tired of them. And, I don’t think that the ghost in this one was necessary. Bradley used the ghost as a narrative cop-out – Miri was the only one who could see the ghost and it helped her get out of sticky situations.

I just wanted more (or something entirely different) from this one.