This list is for the most well known Historical Fiction books on Goodreads.

For purposes of this list, only include books with over 100,000 ratings and shelved at least 1000 times as historical fiction.

Anything with less than 100,000 ratings or shelved less than 1000 times as historical fiction will be removed and without comment.

A book that was set in the time it was written like say Pride and Prejudice is not historical fiction. Please avoid putting these on the list and call them out in comments to discourage people. But librarians shouldn't remove such books from these lists as long as its been tagged incorrectly at least 1000 times.

See also:
Best Historical Fiction
Best Historical Fiction of the 21st Century
Best Historical Mystery
Recommended Historical Fiction
Teen Historical Fiction

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1

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4.31 avg rating — 1,968,366 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 1,151,611 ratings
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4.47 avg rating — 3,014,881 ratings
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4.36 avg rating — 3,484,339 ratings
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4.65 avg rating — 2,082,635 ratings
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3.93 avg rating — 780,015 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 6,866,351 ratings
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4.41 avg rating — 211,978 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 1,729,980 ratings
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4.16 avg rating — 2,107,722 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 1,255,724 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,039,155 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,528 ratings
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3.91 avg rating — 232,827 ratings
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4.37 avg rating — 3,611,553 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 226,582 ratings
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4.14 avg rating — 394,833 ratings
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4.11 avg rating — 1,698,824 ratings
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4.39 avg rating — 2,871,302 ratings
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20

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4.35 avg rating — 828,740 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,827,789 ratings
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4.30 avg rating — 318,406 ratings
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4.32 avg rating — 275,426 ratings
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4.19 avg rating — 809,139 ratings
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25

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4.10 avg rating — 282,396 ratings
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26

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4.39 avg rating — 330,377 ratings
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27

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3.79 avg rating — 241,112 ratings
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28

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4.31 avg rating — 717,769 ratings
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29

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4.09 avg rating — 512,826 ratings
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30

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4.11 avg rating — 792,459 ratings
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31

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4.32 avg rating — 346,660 ratings
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32

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4.16 avg rating — 2,317,590 ratings
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32

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3.87 avg rating — 254,739 ratings
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34

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4.37 avg rating — 275,993 ratings
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35

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4.03 avg rating — 992,320 ratings
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36

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4.34 avg rating — 384,629 ratings
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36

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4.14 avg rating — 358,636 ratings
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38

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3.62 avg rating — 152,624 ratings
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39

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4.44 avg rating — 191,424 ratings
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40

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4.13 avg rating — 212,758 ratings
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41

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4.35 avg rating — 254,669 ratings
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42

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4.11 avg rating — 518,959 ratings
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42

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4.02 avg rating — 173,134 ratings
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44

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4.36 avg rating — 268,794 ratings
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4.10 avg rating — 1,480,386 ratings
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46

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4.44 avg rating — 165,492 ratings
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3.92 avg rating — 1,355,753 ratings
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48

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4.05 avg rating — 314,897 ratings
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49

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4.34 avg rating — 182,925 ratings
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50

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3.88 avg rating — 1,011,130 ratings
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51

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3.93 avg rating — 167,014 ratings
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52

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3.99 avg rating — 885,552 ratings
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52

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4.10 avg rating — 346,415 ratings
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54

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3.74 avg rating — 411,802 ratings
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55

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4.32 avg rating — 664,342 ratings
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56

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4.01 avg rating — 175,075 ratings
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57

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3.80 avg rating — 225,546 ratings
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57

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3.97 avg rating — 709,095 ratings
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59

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4.31 avg rating — 270,294 ratings
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60

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4.25 avg rating — 364,455 ratings
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61

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4.04 avg rating — 662,912 ratings
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61

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4.07 avg rating — 141,518 ratings
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63

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4.17 avg rating — 1,293,361 ratings
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64

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4.16 avg rating — 238,190 ratings
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65

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4.30 avg rating — 273,620 ratings
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66

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4.38 avg rating — 177,116 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 478,455 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,231 ratings
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4.03 avg rating — 160,162 ratings
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3.83 avg rating — 610,176 ratings
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4.33 avg rating — 425,994 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 551,291 ratings
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73

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4.08 avg rating — 271,501 ratings
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74

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3.79 avg rating — 231,050 ratings
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3.82 avg rating — 178,603 ratings
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76

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4.31 avg rating — 875,784 ratings
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77

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3.96 avg rating — 182,496 ratings
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77

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4.42 avg rating — 584,680 ratings
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79

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3.86 avg rating — 194,139 ratings
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80

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4.34 avg rating — 620,943 ratings
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81

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4.47 avg rating — 401,677 ratings
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82

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3.80 avg rating — 276,388 ratings
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83

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4.55 avg rating — 476,480 ratings
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84

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4.33 avg rating — 1,110,557 ratings
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85

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4.18 avg rating — 494,612 ratings
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86

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4.57 avg rating — 238,824 ratings
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87

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3.80 avg rating — 872,509 ratings
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88

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really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 128,089 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 164,707 ratings
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90

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4.06 avg rating — 444,009 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 181,299 ratings
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92

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4.29 avg rating — 505,634 ratings
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93

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3.83 avg rating — 1,335,737 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 465,467 ratings
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95

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3.94 avg rating — 545,980 ratings
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96

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3.92 avg rating — 1,016,823 ratings
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97

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4.09 avg rating — 387,261 ratings
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98

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4.19 avg rating — 212,513 ratings
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99

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4.35 avg rating — 648,548 ratings
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100

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3.93 avg rating — 123,066 ratings
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176 books · 29 voters · list created December 21st, 2020 by Mitchell Friedman (votes) .
5 likes · 
Lists are re-scored approximately every 5 minutes.


Mitchell 11543 books
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Fiona 1668 books
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Rebecca 5584 books
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John 2553 books
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Willow Anne 1665 books
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Rich 85376 books
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Charlotte Igelkott 3128 books
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Comments Showing 1-9 of 9 (9 new)

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message 1: by BookLovingLady (deceased Jan. 25, 2023...) (last edited Dec 22, 2020 01:01AM) (new)

BookLovingLady (deceased Jan. 25, 2023...) There are a number of books on this list which are not historical fiction... (Pride and Prejudice for instance, as it was written in the time it was set).


message 2: by Mitchell (new)

Mitchell Friedman Booklovinglady wrote: "There are a number of books on this list which are not historical fiction... (Pride and Prejudice for instance, as it was written in the time it was set)."

The fun thing about an arbitrary rule - like must be tagged a particular way - is it doesn't have to be right.

I thought about this exact instance when creating this list and I'll put something in the list description.


Charlotte Igelkott Mitchell wrote: "Booklovinglady wrote: "There are a number of books on this list which are not historical fiction... (Pride and Prejudice for instance, as it was written in the time it was set)."

The f..."


Other weird effects of the number of shelvings rule:
The Name of the Rose qualifies for the classics list, but not for the historical fiction list. (Still not sure I can trust my eyes on that one but I've checked and double checked and...nope)
The House of the Spirits qualifies for the historical fiction list, but not for the classics list.
Surely I can't be the only one who thinks the reverse would make more sense? (Not trying to suggest any changes, just genuinely astonished)


message 4: by Emrys (last edited Jan 18, 2021 10:24AM) (new)

Emrys Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Mitchell wrote: "Booklovinglady wrote: "There are a number of books on this list which are not historical fiction... (Pride and Prejudice for instance, as it was written in the time it ..."

I suspect with the The Name of the Rose probably did previously qualify for this list but somehow the genre shelf totals have been been reinterpreted/misinterpreted by Goodreads - e.g. the 4000 or so shelvings it has for “Fiction” is similar to the number of shelvings Fall of Giants has for “historical fiction” (the two books both have about 300,000 ratings).


Charlotte Igelkott Emrys wrote: "Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Mitchell wrote: "Booklovinglady wrote: "There are a number of books on this list which are not historical fiction... (Pride and Prejudice for instance, as it ..."

Oh. Sounds a bit odd to me, but then I'm not very tech savvy. Is this the sort of thing that would be likely to flip back and forth at random or will it be stable until someone notices and changes it back? (Assuming the current numbers are wrong, of course) How can one tell if tNotR is the only book this has happened to or if it's a widespread phenomenon? Would it be likely to have affected other shelves as well? And from a librarian point of view, should I stop deleting books for insufficient shelvings for now?
(Sorry if I'm being too inquisitive - would be better to contact support, perhaps?)


message 6: by Emrys (new)

Emrys Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Emrys wrote: "Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Mitchell wrote: "Booklovinglady wrote: "There are a number of books on this list which are not historical fiction... (Pride and Prejudice for in..."

I have a spreadsheet of books that records 4000+ shelvings for the genre “Historical Fiction” - I used this tool to get the genre data: https://github.com/PaulKlinger/Enhanc... , but I can’t be sure if the discrepancy is because of an error made by the tool, or because of Goodreads changing things.

Yes, I’ll try asking Support about it later. I don’t get the impression that it’s a widespread problem (just this book actually).


Charlotte Igelkott Emrys wrote: "Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Emrys wrote: "Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Mitchell wrote: "Booklovinglady wrote: "There are a number of books on this list which are not historical fiction... ([book:Pride..."

That sounds reassuring. Thank you for answering :)


message 8: by Emrys (new)

Emrys Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Emrys wrote: "Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Emrys wrote: "Charlotte Igelkott wrote: "Mitchell wrote: "Booklovinglady wrote: "There are a number of books on this list which are not historical fiction....."

I raised this issue with Support and they said they’d get the developers to look into it.

If it’s not sorted in a week or two I guess the book can be removed from the list.


message 9: by Emrys (new)

Emrys The Name of the Rose now has 4300 shelvings as "Historical Fiction" so it seems the issue has been fixed.


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