New books by Historical Novel Society members, May 2023

Congrats to our author members on these new releases!  If you’ve written a historical novel or nonfiction work published (or to be published) in May or after, please send the following details via our contact form by July 7: author, title, publisher, release date, and a blurb of one sentence or less. Space is limited, so concise blurbs are appreciated. Details will appear in August’s magazine. Submissions may be edited.

Why did Julius Caesar build a bridge over the Rhine River in only 10 days – could a woman have been involved?  Learn more in Caesar Obsessed: Passion, Conquest and Tragedy in Gaul by Anthony R. Licata (G. Anton Publishing, July 2022).

In G. M. Baker’s St. Agnes and the Selkie, book two of Cuthbert’s People (independently published, Nov 2022), when Mother Wynflaed finds a beautiful but terrified young woman on her doorstep, she begins to see her as a daughter, but the girl she names Agnes attracts the eye of kings and Vikings alike.

Autumn, 1811: Lady Rosamund’s plan for a quiet return to London society goes awry when her brother is accused of murder in Lady Rosamund and the Plague of Suitors by Barbara Monajem (Level Best Books, Nov. 29, 2022).

In Our Man in Mbabane: A Novel Based on a True Story by K. E. Karl (Independently published, Dec. 5, 2022), Frank George, an idealistic young American, travels to Swaziland in 1977, gets a job, experiences adventures, romances, and self-doubts, all while hiding his real mission: to smuggle weapons into South Africa for Nelson Mandela’s African National Congress.

In Yvon Delville’s A Land of Hope and Spirits (Independently published, Dec. 30, 2022), in the early 1700s, Elise Crowley must disregard her own safety to promote peace and protect her family as she and her spymaster husband settle on the Connecticut River Valley, facing hostile Abenakis, intolerant Puritans, and murderous enemies of Great Britain.

Pat Wahler’s The Rose of Washington Square: A Novel of Rose O’Neill, Creator of the Kewpie Doll (Evergreen Tree Press, LLC, Jan. 21) follows a young self-taught artist who travels to New York in 1893, determined to break into the male-dominated field of illustration: a path destined to transform her from an unknown impoverished girl into one of the most famous women of her era.

In The Needle of Avocation by G. M. Baker, book three of Cuthbert’s People (independently published, Jan 2023), Hilda is the second sister, the plain one, the put upon; in her kidnapped sister’s place, she must go where she is not wanted, marry a man she does not know, and stand before the rage of a king.

When their opposing beliefs collide, Kate and Peter witness a true test of faith in the ability of mankind to shed the past in order to preserve the future… and perhaps learn that the “greatest of these” truly is love, as told in Marguerite Martin Gray’s Promise of Purity, Book Two in the Gardens in Time Series (Celebrate Lit Publishing, Feb. 14).

The Deadliest Deceptions by June Trop (Level Best Books/Historia, Feb. 14), featuring Miriam bat Isaac, amateur sleuth extraordinaire, takes you to first-century CE Roman Alexandria to assist her in nine baffling cases ranging from cozy to noir.

Sandy Frykholm’s The Islands Call (Parenti Publishing, Feb. 22), a time-slip adventure, takes Gino, a phony astrology writer in Seattle, and Sara, a closet clairvoyant, on a wild ride when Gino disappears while swimming in Italy, and Sara is the only person who knows he’s still alive.

With Fire and Sword (Independently published, Feb. 25) is Book 4 in the Thunder on the Moor historical time-travel romance series by Andrea Matthews.

In Lara Byrne’s The Road to Canossa (Independently published, Mar.), the characters of her debut Lotharingia return for another early medieval drama, inspired by the tumultuous events that led a king of Germany to seek the intercession of Comitissa Matilde, the most powerful woman in Europe.

Poe Street by Michael Raleigh (Level Best Books/Historia, Mar. 1), taking place in the summer of 1946, shows how the murder of a Gatsbyesque millionaire and theft of a valuable statue sets off a string of related killings, and Ray Foley, just back from WWII, finds himself involved.

Within If I Had a Hammer by Teresa Trent (Level Best Books/Historia, Mar. 14), set in 1963, Dot Morgan feels Camelot has ended as she works a frustrating job as a secretary and then sees a friend murdered.

As WWI draws to a close, an idealistic soldier in the Czechoslovak Legion embarks on a perilous journey across war-torn Russia in a bid for Czechoslovak independence, becoming entangled in the Russian civil war and a sham marriage with a former Russian aristocrat in A Waltz with Traitors by A. L. Sowards (Covenant Communications, Mar. 14).

In The Truth We Hide by Liz Milliron (Level Best Books/Historia, Mar. 14), Betty Ahern investigates murder against the backdrop of war activities and homophobia in 1943 Buffalo.

A deeply researched work of historical fiction, Mark Warren’s A Last Serenade for Billy Bonney (Five Star, Mar. 17) follows the life of Billy the Kid from age fourteen, when he becomes an orphan, to his violent death at twenty-one years old, when he steps into a dark room to encounter his nemesis, Pat Garrett.

The Lady of the Lighthouse by Terri Greening (World Castle Publishing, Mar. 20) reveals the story of a pirate, a Great Lakes shipping captain, a dashing Italian spy, and the lonely, pregnant young mother who loved them all.

In Murder on the Pneumatic Railway by Lisa M. Lane (Grousable Books, Mar. 22), the body of an ordinary postal clerk is found inside a pneumatic railway car in 1870 London; Tommy Jones and his friends must solve the mystery to exonerate his former tutor.

In 1898 St. Louis, Nellie Bly wannabe Jemmy McBustle goes undercover in a ladies’ insane asylum where she finds corruption and finds herself a corset squeeze away from long term commitment in See President McKinley or Die Trying by Fedora Amis (Mardon Moore Books, Mar. 23).

Larry Zuckerman’s debut novel, Lonely Are the Brave (Cynren Press, Apr.) centers on a working-class war hero who returns to his Washington logging town in 1919, where he becomes a full-time father, causing a scandal, while the timber baron’s daughter struggles for equality in her marriage—and when the two overcome mutual distrust to trade secrets, their lives change forever.

A haunted painter’s past life visions are not the creative inspiration they seemed: they’re a harbinger of her ancient revenge vow, and her FBI husband won’t find the serial killer until she fulfills it… but it may already be too late. Read more in Through the Veneer of Time by Vera Bell (Champagne Book Group, Apr. 3).

Kansas 1905: Two ex-dancehall girls take to the road to find an old enemy and kill him before he gets to them first in this novel of mishaps, blunders, con men, the price of friendship and the circling noose of the law in K.T. Blakemore’s The Good Time Girls (Sycamore Creek Press, April 4).

In Laura Langdon’s Nobody’s Bride (Bayer’s Den, Apr. 10), set in Washington Territory, 1878: a farmer’s life is shattered after his young wife of only 6 months runs off with the traveling photographer from their wedding; desperate for a helpmate, he takes pity on an unknown spinster whose days pass in servitude.

Trouble lurks in the Lowcountry of South Carolina in the guise of a family feud, forbidden love, and a journalist hell-bent on uncovering corruption in Homespun by Sophia Alexander (Onalex Books, Apr 16), the final installment of The Silk Trilogy.

As told in The Movie Queen by Emily W. Skinner (Independently published, Apr. 30), Everly Knight never caught on to the New Math or other subjects during her family’s frequent moves in the 1960s, but she was up to date on Elizabeth Taylor’s romances thanks to her mother’s obsession with Hollywood gossip magazines; it was nothing short of a miracle that her Catholic mom could afford a weekly box office fix for a cab full of kids.

The Drowned Court (Meanda Books, Apr. 24), Book II in Tracey Warr’s Conquest trilogy on Nest ferch Rhys and King Henry I, is set in the 12th century and involves a dramatic kidnap and a devastating shipwreck.

Featuring a young Frenchwoman who navigates a deadly game of cat and mouse in the treacherous medieval court of Cyprus, Amy Maroney‘s new novel, The Queen’s Scribe (Artelan Press, Apr. 25), is a stand-alone tale in the Sea and Stone Chronicles.

In MiJa by Mark Atkinson (Bookmark Publications, May 1), opening in Mun-gyeong, South Korea, in 1935, the Choi family are wealthy landowners and have been for nineteen generations, but all that is about to change as burgeoning love is put on hold and the family must endure the hardship of the Japanese Occupation, the Second World War, and the Korean War.

Tracey Warr’s The Anarchy (Meanda Books, May 1), Book III in her Conquest trilogy, is set in the 12th century: Sheriff Haith is on the trail of a mass murderer, while his sister is in grave danger as a runaway nun, and his lover Nest ferch Rhys is also at risk as she becomes increasingly embroiled in the Welsh resistance to the Norman occupation.

Catherine McCullagh’s latest novel, Resistance and Revenge (Big Sky Publishing, May), fits neatly into the World War II alternate history genre with a gritty story of a rural English village in the grip of occupation and the ragtag resistance group that pits its meagre forces against the might of the brutal invader who hunts them day and night, paying informers in blood money as the thirst for revenge increases inexorably.

Described as ‘a fully realised Gothic world’ by David Punter, author of the seminal The Literature of Terror, leading Bram Stoker and Gothic scholar Matthew Gibson debuts in fiction with a fast-moving mystery-thriller, set in Victorian London – Mr Stoker and the Vampires of the Lyceum (The Book Guild, May 28).

Tucson, Arizona Territory, 1871: abducted amid the massacre of 150 Apache women at Camp Grant, a young Apache grieves for her lost heritage; misled by others, a Mexicana woman in Tucson seeks out the truth about her husband’s involvement in Venetia Hobson Lewis’s Changing Woman, a Novel of the Camp Grant Massacre (Univ. of Nebraska Press, June 1), based on a true event.

Botanist Linnea Wren journeys across the world to the magical island of Chiloé; will she realize her dreams of botanical discovery, or will romance and her murder investigation draw her closer to becoming the next victim? Read more in Voyage of the Pleiades by Amy Marie Turner (Fauve Press, June 6).

The House of Atreus: Clytemnestra’s Bind by Susan C. Wilson (Neem Tree Press, June 15) centers on one of Greek mythology’s most reviled characters—a woman who challenged the absolute power of men—in a fiery tale of power, family rivalry and a mother’s burning love.

Linda Ulleseit’s The River Remembers (She Writes Press, June 27) is a story of the cultural convergence of three women, White, Native American, and Black, at Fort Snelling in 1835 Minnesota.

Yesteryear by Stephen G. Eoannou (SFWP, Oct.) takes readers on a magical journey leading to The Lone Ranger’s radio debut, a show that provided hope to Americans during the early days of the Great Depression.