Other books that might interest you

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  Mad Richard

  Lesley Krueger

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  A riveting story of talent and the price it exacts, set in a richly imagined Victorian England 
  Called the most promising artist of his generation, handsome, modest, and affectionate, Richard Dadd rubbed shoulders with the great luminaries of the Victorian Age. He grew up along the Medway with Charles Dickens and studied at the Royal Academy Schools under the brilliant and eccentric J.M.W. Turner. 
  Based on Dadd’s tragic true story, Mad Richard follows the young artist as he develops his craft, contemplates the nature of art and fame — as he watches Dickens navigate those tricky waters — and ultimately finds himself imprisoned in Bedlam for murder, committed as criminally insane. 
  In 1853, Charlotte Brontë — about to publish her third novel, suffering from unrequited love, and herself wrestling with questions about art and artists, class, obsession and romance — visits Richard at Bedlam and finds an unexpected kinship in his feverish mind and his haunting work. 
  Masterfully slipping through time and memory, Mad Richard maps the artistic temperaments of Charlotte and Richard, weaving their divergent lives together with their shared fears and follies, dreams, and crushing illusions.

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  The Maid - A Novel of Joan of Arc

  Kimberly Cutter

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  It is the fifteenth century, and the tumultuous Hundred Years' War rages on. France is under siege, English soldiers tear through the countryside destroying all who cross their path, and Charles VII, the uncrowned king, has neither the strength nor the will to rally his army. And in the quiet of her parents' garden in Domrémy, a peasant girl sees a spangle of light and hears a powerful voice speak her name. Jehanne.The story of Jehanne d'Arc, the visionary and saint who believed she had been chosen by God, who led an army and saved her country, has captivated our imagination for centuries. But the story of Jehanne-the girl-whose sister was murdered by the English, who sought an escape from a violent father and a forced marriage, who taught herself to ride and fight, and who somehow found the courage and tenacity to persuade first one, then two, then thousands to follow her, is at once thrilling, unexpected, and heartbreaking. Rich with unspoken love and battlefield valor, The Maid is a novel about the power and uncertainty of faith, and the exhilarating and devastating consequences of fame.

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  Justice - Stories

  Larry Watson

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  The author of Montana 1948 explores the early years of a powerful Western family in these “beautifully written” linked stories (USA Today). 
   
  Larry Watson’s bestselling novel Montana 1948 was acclaimed as a “work of art,” a prize-winning evocation of a time, a place, and a family (San Francisco Chronicle). Justice is the stunning prequel that illuminates the Hayden clan’s early years, and the circumstances that led to the events of Montana 1948. With the precision of a master storyteller, Watson moves seamlessly through the decades and among the strong and hard-bitten characters that make up the Hayden family, and in the process opens an evocative window on the very heart of the American West. 
   
  “An engrossing story of love, familial relationships, and secrets . . . re-creates the vivid beauty of Big Sky country.” —Booklist 
   
  “Filled with rugged prose sometimes as biting as a northern plains wind.” —The Washington Post 
   
  “Surprises and scenes of dramatic power punctuate the narrative . . . Throughout, Watson writes with ruthless honesty about his characters’ stunted dreams, unpredictable emotions and outbursts of senseless violence, showing once again that he understands not only the West but the untamed hearts that have roamed it.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

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  Red Plenty

  Francis Spufford

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  Strange as it may seem, the gray, oppressive USSR was founded on a fairy tale. It was built on the twentieth-century magic called "the planned economy," which was going to gush forth an abundance of good things that the lands of capitalism could never match. And just for a little while, in the heady years of the late 1950s, the magic seemed to be working. Red Plenty is about that moment in history, and how it came, and how it went away; about the brief era when, under the rash leadership of Khrushchev, the Soviet Union looked forward to a future of rich communists and envious capitalists, when Moscow would out-glitter Manhattan and every Lada would be better engineered than a Porsche. It's about the scientists who did their genuinely brilliant best to make the dream come true, to give the tyranny its happy ending. 
  Red Plenty is history, it's fiction, it's as ambitious as Sputnik, as uncompromising as an Aeroflot flight attendant, and as different from what you were expecting as a glass of Soviet champagne.

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  Pass Guard at Ypres - A Novel

  Ronald Gruner

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  From a World War I veteran: A novel of the years-long, brutal battle at Ypres, Belgium, and what it did to the city and the men who fought there. In 1915, a platoon of inexperienced British soldiers arrives in Flanders, excited and anxious for what is to come. But they soon find themselves at Ypres, where the battle-weary Allied troops have dug in and slaughter surrounds them. Soldiers, from privates to senior officers of the wider battalion, frozen by terror and overwhelmed by the relentless stress as the battle drags on, want nothing more than to hide. Young, dedicated officer Freddy Mann is in the thick of it with his men—burying the dead, experiencing the terror of bombardment, and being picked off by snipers. On a journey from idealistic officer barely out of school to battle-hardened cynic barely hanging on as those around him are cut down, Mann suffers a crisis of faith as he loses his belief in the war and everything he once stood for. Written by a WWI veteran, Pass Guard at Ypres brings to life the harrowing realities of the Great War, portraying years of lengthy fighting in—and the pivotal strategic role of—the ancient and once-peaceful town on the bank of the Ieperlee River.

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  Marking Time

  Elizabeth Jane Howard

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  For fans of Downton Abbey, the second volume of the critically acclaimed Cazalet saga takes readers into the lives of an extended British family and their devoted retinue   It is 1939, and Hitler has just invaded Poland. The exigencies of wartime will force the Cazalets to make difficult choices as the older children are evacuated from London and settled in Home Place, their longtime Sussex summer estate.   Narrated primarily through the voices of three Cazalet cousins—sixteen-year-old Louise and fourteen-year-old Polly and Clary—Marking Time details the continuing saga of their fathers. With the outbreak of war, Edward is determined to do his part for England. Hugh, crippled in World War I, must sit back and watch other men fight for their country, including his brother Rupert, who enlists and goes missing in action.   The Cazalets’ story plays out against the greater drama unfolding on the world stage. Three young girls yearn for the freedom they believe adulthood will confer upon them in this tale of struggle and sacrifice, love and loss, as a new generation of Cazalets makes itself heard. With strong female characters such as the stoic Kitty; her daughter, Rachel, who’s in a relationship with another woman; and the loyal governess Miss Milliment, Marking Time explores the role of women during the war amid early stirrings of feminism.  

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