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 — 1,960,514 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 1,149,257 ratings
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4.47 avg rating — 3,006,404 ratings
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4.36 avg rating — 3,474,912 ratings
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4.65 avg rating — 2,064,139 ratings
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3.93 avg rating — 779,098 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 6,842,320 ratings
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4.41 avg rating — 211,565 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 1,725,789 ratings
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10

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4.16 avg rating — 2,104,895 ratings
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11

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4.31 avg rating — 1,254,672 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,030,523 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,312 ratings
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14

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3.91 avg rating — 232,438 ratings
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4.37 avg rating — 3,592,332 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 226,293 ratings
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17

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4.14 avg rating — 394,266 ratings
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18

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4.11 avg rating — 1,696,433 ratings
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4.39 avg rating — 2,863,113 ratings
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20

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4.35 avg rating — 826,821 ratings
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21

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3.90 avg rating — 2,818,673 ratings
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22

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4.30 avg rating — 317,358 ratings
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4.32 avg rating — 274,865 ratings
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24

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4.19 avg rating — 807,645 ratings
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25

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4.10 avg rating — 282,071 ratings
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26

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4.39 avg rating — 329,974 ratings
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27

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3.79 avg rating — 240,886 ratings
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28

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4.31 avg rating — 716,097 ratings
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29

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4.09 avg rating — 512,394 ratings
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30

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4.11 avg rating — 791,507 ratings
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31

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4.32 avg rating — 346,122 ratings
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32

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4.16 avg rating — 2,311,660 ratings
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32

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3.87 avg rating — 254,475 ratings
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34

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4.37 avg rating — 275,307 ratings
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35

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4.03 avg rating — 990,443 ratings
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36

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4.34 avg rating — 384,116 ratings
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36

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4.14 avg rating — 357,682 ratings
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38

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3.62 avg rating — 152,501 ratings
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39

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4.44 avg rating — 191,166 ratings
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40

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4.13 avg rating — 212,643 ratings
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41

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4.35 avg rating — 253,791 ratings
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42

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4.11 avg rating — 517,912 ratings
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42

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4.02 avg rating — 172,328 ratings
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44

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4.36 avg rating — 268,440 ratings
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45

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4.10 avg rating — 1,477,862 ratings
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46

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4.44 avg rating — 165,260 ratings
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47

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3.92 avg rating — 1,353,655 ratings
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48

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4.05 avg rating — 314,634 ratings
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49

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4.34 avg rating — 182,469 ratings
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50

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3.88 avg rating — 1,009,702 ratings
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51

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3.93 avg rating — 166,942 ratings
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52

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3.99 avg rating — 884,604 ratings
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52

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4.10 avg rating — 346,043 ratings
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54

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3.74 avg rating — 411,177 ratings
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55

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4.32 avg rating — 662,035 ratings
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56

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4.01 avg rating — 174,875 ratings
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57

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3.80 avg rating — 225,513 ratings
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57

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3.97 avg rating — 708,690 ratings
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59

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4.31 avg rating — 269,474 ratings
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60

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4.25 avg rating — 364,198 ratings
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61

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4.04 avg rating — 662,451 ratings
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61

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4.07 avg rating — 141,411 ratings
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63

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4.17 avg rating — 1,289,965 ratings
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64

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4.16 avg rating — 237,943 ratings
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65

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4.30 avg rating — 272,959 ratings
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66

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4.38 avg rating — 176,775 ratings
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67

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4.04 avg rating — 477,925 ratings
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68

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4.04 avg rating — 156,037 ratings
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4.03 avg rating — 160,053 ratings
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69

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3.83 avg rating — 609,252 ratings
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69

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4.33 avg rating — 425,375 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 549,651 ratings
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73

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4.08 avg rating — 271,117 ratings
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74

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3.79 avg rating — 230,710 ratings
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75

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3.82 avg rating — 178,430 ratings
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76

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4.31 avg rating — 874,926 ratings
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77

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3.96 avg rating — 182,346 ratings
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77

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4.42 avg rating — 584,197 ratings
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79

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3.86 avg rating — 194,017 ratings
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80

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4.34 avg rating — 618,009 ratings
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81

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4.47 avg rating — 400,579 ratings
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82

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3.80 avg rating — 276,212 ratings
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83

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4.55 avg rating — 475,963 ratings
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84

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4.33 avg rating — 1,107,542 ratings
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85

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4.18 avg rating — 494,260 ratings
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86

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4.57 avg rating — 237,503 ratings
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87

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3.80 avg rating — 871,080 ratings
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88

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really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 127,899 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 164,643 ratings
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90

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4.06 avg rating — 443,225 ratings
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91

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4.06 avg rating — 181,186 ratings
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92

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4.29 avg rating — 504,160 ratings
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93

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3.83 avg rating — 1,334,818 ratings
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94

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4.05 avg rating — 463,481 ratings
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95

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3.94 avg rating — 545,151 ratings
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96

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3.92 avg rating — 1,014,793 ratings
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97

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4.09 avg rating — 387,027 ratings
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98

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4.19 avg rating — 212,297 ratings
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99

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4.35 avg rating — 645,948 ratings
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100

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3.93 avg rating — 122,903 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 11530 books
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Fiona 1667 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)

dateUp arrow    newest »

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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