Historical Fiction with Emphasis on Characters and Relationships

Try these books if you're looking for:

• Great stories
• Historical fiction
• Romantic suspense
• Books about characters and relationships

The Forgotten Garden
By Kate Morton
F MORTON
Abandoned on a 1913 voyage to Australia, Nell is raised by a dock master and his wife who do not tell her until she is an adult that she is not their child, leading Nell to return to England and eventually hand down her quest for answers to her granddaughter.

Rules of Civility
By Amor Towles
F TOWLES
A chance encounter with a handsome banker in a jazz bar on New Year’s Eve 1938 catapults Wall Street secretary Katey Kontent into the upper echelons of New York society, where she befriends a shy multi-millionaire, an Upper East Side ne’er-do-well, and a single-minded widow.

The Secret History of the Pink Carnation
By Lauren Willig
F WILLIG Pink Car #1
Leaving Harvard to complete her dissertation on the Scarlet Pimpernel and the Purple Gentian in England, Eloise Kelly discovers information about the most elusive spy of all time, a figure who single-handedly saved England from Napoleon's invasion.

The Peach Keeper
By Sarah Addison Allen
F ALLEN
Returning to the hometown of her youth after a failed marriage, Willa struggles to find her place in a community where she no longer feels like she belongs, uncovers a 60-year family feud and falls for a strangely secretive man.

Russian Winter
By Daphne Kalotay
F KALOTAY
Former Bolshoi ballerina Nina Revskaya auctions off her jewelry collection and becomes overwhelmed by memories of her homeland, the friends she left behind amidst Stalinist aggression, and the dark secret that brought her to a new life in Boston.

Contemporary Paranormal Romances

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• Romance
• Paranormal creatures
• Contemporary books

Edge of Twilight
By Maggie Shayne
ROMANCE SHAYNE
In order to quench his thirst for revenge, Edge, the last of the Immortals, joins forces with Amber Lily, the only half human, half vampire ever born, to destroy the enemy--an alliance that plunges them into a dark realm of evil where passion is the key to their survival.

Blue Moon
By Lori Handeland
ROMANCE HANDELAN
When the wolf population of Miniwa, Wisconsin begins to stalk human prey, officer Jessie McQuade enlists professor Will Cadotte, a Native American activist, to help her investigate. As Jessie follows the trail to the shocking truth, she'll have to decide who she can trust when the moon is full.

How to Marry a Millionaire Vampire
By Kerry Sparks
ROMANCE SPARKS
On the run from the Russian mob after witnessing a brutal murder, dentist Shanna Whelan is rescued from certain death by Roman Draganesti, a charming and wealthy vampire in search of a dentist who can repair his broken fang.

Dates from Hell
ROMANCE STORIES DATES
Four popular romance authors explore the seductive and dangerous world of the supernatural in four sensuous tales of romance with demon lovers, werewolves, and the undead.

Undone
By Rachel Caine
SCI-FI Outcast #1
Once she was Cassiel, a Djinn of limitless power. Now, she has been reshaped in human flesh as a punishment for defying her master. Cursed to live among mortals, Cassiel finds refuge among the Weather Wardens until she encounters an evil force that threatens the family she has become closest to, forcing her to realize that her perceived human weaknesses may be her greatest strengths.

City of Bones
By Cassandra Claire
YA F CLARE #1
Able to see demons and the Darkhunters who are dedicated to returning them to their own dimension, fifteen-year-old Clary Fray is drawn into this bizarre world when her mother disappears and Clary herself is almost killed by a monster.

Janet Evanovich Read-alikes

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• Contemporary books
  
• Mystery series
• Female lead character
• Read-alikes for Janet Evanovich

The Dangerous Edge of Things
By Tina Whittle
MYSTERY WHITTLE Tai Rand #1
Trying to run her newly inherited Confederate-themed gun shop, Tia Randolph's life is turned upside down when she finds a dead body in her brother's driveway. /div>

Bubbles Unbound
By Sarah Strohmeyer
MYSTERY STROHMEY
Against all odds, Bubbles Yablonsky has returned to school, but while on her way to journalism school, she happens upon a crime scene and finds herself drawn into a murder investigation.

Dating Dead Men
By Harley Jane Kozak
MYSTERY KOZAK
As part of her research for talk show host Dr. Cookie Lahven's upcoming book "How to Avoid Getting Dumped All the Time," Wollie Shelley is dating forty men in sixty days, but her assignment is complicated by an unexpected corpse.

Swift Justice
By Laura A. H. DiSilverio
MYSTERY DISILVER
Charlotte "Charlie" Swift, a former Air Force investigator turned private eye, likes her solitary existence. When her silent partner flees the the country, leaving his socialite wife Gigi with a half interest in the business, Charlie must find a way to cope with her while also investigating the case of an abandoned baby.

The War Against Miss Winter
By Kathryn Miller Haines
MYSTERY HAINES
Struggling with missing her enlisted boyfriend, a lack of employment, and the growing impact of World War II on her New York City home, aspiring actress Rosie Winter reluctantly accepts work with a lowbrow detective agency and is caught up in a high-society mystery when her new boss is murdered. (Though it is a historical mystery series, it has a strong, smart mouth female character, similar to Evanovich's Stephanie Plum.)

Ordinary People Doing Amazing Things

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• Adventure

Across the Nightingale Floor
By Lian Hearn
F HEARN Tales of #1
In a novel set in a land much like ancient Japan, a young boy named Takeo becomes a pawn in the ceaseless wars between rival warlord clans in a culture ruled by codes of honor and formal rituals.

Mistborn
By Brandon Sanderson
SCI-FI SANDERSO Mistborn #1
Experiencing an epiphany within the most daunting prison of the monstrous Lord Ruler, half-Skaa Kelsier finds himself taking on the powers of a Mistborn, and teams up with ragged orphan Vin in a desperate plot to save their world.

Wizard’s First Rule
By Terry Goodkind
SCI-FI GOODKIND Sword of #1
An unearthly adversary descends on an idyllic fantasy world, corrupting magic against good and slaughtering innocents, and only a single man can stop him.

Odd Thomas
By Dean Koontz
F KOONTZ Odd Thom #1
Over the course of two days, Odd Thomas, his soul-mate Stormy Llewellyn, and an assortment of allies make their way through a dark, terrifying world in which past and present, and life and death collide as they try to avert a cataclysm..

Assassin’s Apprentice
By Robin Hobb
SCI-FI HOBB
As Fitz, an outcast and the bastard son of Prince Chivalry, grows to manhood, a legacy of magical skill and other mysterious talents propels him into the role of protector of the kingdom, if his initial perilous mission does not destroy him first.