If you’re looking for Historical Fiction related to the Civil War, Slavery, and Abolition:

• Beloved, by Toni Morrison

• Booth, by Karen Joy Fowler

• Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier

• Enemy Women, by Paulette Jiles

• Gone with the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell

• John Brown’s Women, by Susan Higginbotham

• Kindred, by Octavia Butler

• Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott

• March, by Geraldine Brooks

• Mrs. Lincoln’s Dressmaker, by Jennifer Chiaverini

• Sunflower Sisters, by Martha Hall Kelly

• The Invention of Wings, by Sue Monk Kidd

• The Killer Angers, by Michael Shaara

• The Red Badge of Courage, by Stephen Crane

• The Tie That Bound Us: The Women of John Brown’s Family and the Legacy of Radical Abolitionism, by Bonnie Laughlin Schultz

• The Underground Railroad, by Colson Whitehead

• Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriett Beecher Stowe

• Varina, by Charles Frazier

If you’re looking for Nonfiction Texts related to the Civil War, Slavery, and Abolition:

• 12 Years a Slave, by Solomon Northrup

• Black Flag: Guerrilla Warfare on the Western Border, by Thomas Goodrich

• Caste: The Origins of Our Discontent, by Isabel Wilkerson

• Defending the Arteries of Rebellion: Confederate Naval Operations in the Mississippi River Valley, 1861-1865, by Neil Chatelain

• Entertaining History: The Civil War in Literature, Film, and Song, edited by Chris Mackowski

• Fearless Purpose: A Blind Nurse in the Civil War, by Emily Elizabeth Parsons & Catherine Chandler Parsons

• Grant’s Last Battle: The Story Behind the Personal Memoir of Ulysses S. Grant, by Chris Mackowski

• Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, by Harriett Jacobs

• Inside War: The Guerrilla Conflict in Missouri During the American Civil War, by Michael Fellman

• Jesse James and the Civil War, by Robert L. Dyer

• John Brown’s Raid: Harpers Ferry and the Coming of the Civil War, by Jon-Erik M. Gilot and Kevin R. Pawlak

• Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, by Frederick Douglass

• The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story, created by Nikole Hannah-Jones

• The History of Andrew and DeKalb Counties, Missouri, by Southern Historical Press

• The Homefront in Civil War Missouri, by James W. Erwin

• Train of Innocents: The Story of the Kennedy Train, by Everell Cummins

If you’re looking for other U.S.-related Historical Fiction that I’ve enjoyed:

• A Light in the Forest, by Conrad Richter

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, by Betty Smith

• American Dirt, by Jeanine Cummins

• America’s First Daughter, by Stephanie Dray

• Before We Were Yours, by Lisa Wingate

• Bless Me Ultima, by Rudolfo Anaya

• Caleb’s Crossing, by Geraldine Brooks

• Children of the River, by Linda Crew

• Death Comes to the Archbishop, by Willa Cather

• Dragonwings, by Lawrence Yep

• Fever 1793, by Laurie Halse Anderson

• Finding Dorothy, by Elizabeth Letts

• Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War, by Nathaniel Philbrick

• Mrs. Poe, by Lynn Cullen

• My Antonia, by Willa Cather

• My Dear Hamilton, by Stephanie Dray

• O Pioneers, by Willa Cather

• Orphan Train, By Christina Baker Kline

• The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie

• The Bean Trees, by Barbara Kingsolver

• The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, by Kim Michele Richardson

• The Call of the Wild, by Jack London

• The Color Purple, by Alice Walker

• The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck

• The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald

• The Help, by Kathryn Stockett

• The Joy Luck Club, by Amy Tan

• To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee

• The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd

• The Women, by Kristin Hannah

• Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston

• There There, by Tommy Orange

• West with Giraffes, by Lynda Rutledge

• Zorro, by Isabel Allende

If you’re looking for Holocaust and WWII-related Historical Fiction:

• All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr

• Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl, by Anne Frank

• Catch-22, by Joseph Heller

• Cilka’s Journey, by Heather Morris

• Corelli’s Mandolin, by Louis De Bernieres

• Farewell to Manzanar, by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston

• Hiroshima, by John Hersey

• Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, by Jamie Ford

• In the Distant Land of My Father, by Bo Caldwell

• Lilac Girls, by Martha Hall Kelly 

• Night, by Elie Wiesel 

• No-No Boy, by John Okada

• Sarah’s Key, by Tatiana de Rosnay

• Schindler’s List, by Thomas Keneally

• Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut

• Suite Francaise, by Irene Nemirovsky

• Survival in Auschwitz, by Primo Levi

• The Alice Network, by Kate Quinn

• The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, by John Boyne

• The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak

• The Chosen, by Chaim Potok

• The Devil’s Arithmetic, by Jane Yolen

• The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, by Shaffer & Barrows

• The Hiding Place, by Corrie Ten Boom

• The Librarian of Auschwitz, by Antonio Iturbe

• The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah

• The Rose Code, by Kate Quinn

• The Tattooist of Auschwitz, by Heather Morris

• The Zookeeper’s Wife, by Diane Ackerman

• Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand

• We Were the Lucky Ones, by Georgia Hunter

If you’re looking for Mythology-Related Fiction:

I’ve taught Greek mythology to my freshmen for many years now, including Homer’s The Odyssey, Sophocles’s Oedipus the King and Antigone, and various love, hero, and punishment myths. In recent years, I’ve been happy to see so many “retellings” of these stories come out in novel form. Here are some of my favorites:

• A Thousand Ships, by Natalie Haynes

• Ariadne, by Jennifer Saint

• Circe, by Madeline Miller

• Electra, by Jennifer Saint

• Stone Blind, by Natalie Haynes

• The Children of Jocasta, by Natalie Haynes

• The Penelopiad, by Margaret Atwood

• The Song of Achilles, by Madeline Miller

• Till We Have Faces, by C.S. Lewis