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 — 1,966,618 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 1,151,104 ratings
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4.47 avg rating — 3,013,186 ratings
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4.65 avg rating — 2,077,902 ratings
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3.93 avg rating — 779,762 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 6,860,795 ratings
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4.41 avg rating — 211,856 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 1,728,639 ratings
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4.16 avg rating — 2,107,082 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 1,255,519 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,036,515 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,472 ratings
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3.91 avg rating — 232,714 ratings
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4.37 avg rating — 3,607,409 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 226,521 ratings
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4.14 avg rating — 394,667 ratings
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4.11 avg rating — 1,698,316 ratings
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4.39 avg rating — 2,869,254 ratings
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4.35 avg rating — 828,257 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,825,488 ratings
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4.30 avg rating — 318,092 ratings
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4.32 avg rating — 275,272 ratings
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4.19 avg rating — 808,786 ratings
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4.10 avg rating — 282,309 ratings
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4.39 avg rating — 330,265 ratings
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3.79 avg rating — 241,055 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 717,267 ratings
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4.09 avg rating — 512,730 ratings
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30

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4.11 avg rating — 792,200 ratings
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31

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4.32 avg rating — 346,532 ratings
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32

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4.16 avg rating — 2,316,056 ratings
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32

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3.87 avg rating — 254,658 ratings
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34

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4.37 avg rating — 275,826 ratings
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35

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4.03 avg rating — 991,851 ratings
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36

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4.34 avg rating — 384,492 ratings
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36

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4.14 avg rating — 358,350 ratings
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38

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3.62 avg rating — 152,578 ratings
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39

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4.44 avg rating — 191,360 ratings
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40

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4.13 avg rating — 212,731 ratings
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4.35 avg rating — 254,445 ratings
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42

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4.11 avg rating — 518,614 ratings
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4.02 avg rating — 172,885 ratings
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4.36 avg rating — 268,709 ratings
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4.10 avg rating — 1,479,677 ratings
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4.44 avg rating — 165,436 ratings
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3.92 avg rating — 1,355,258 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 314,823 ratings
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4.34 avg rating — 182,792 ratings
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50

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3.88 avg rating — 1,010,778 ratings
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51

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3.93 avg rating — 166,991 ratings
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52

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3.99 avg rating — 885,289 ratings
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52

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4.10 avg rating — 346,290 ratings
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54

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3.74 avg rating — 411,596 ratings
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55

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4.32 avg rating — 663,724 ratings
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56

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4.01 avg rating — 175,019 ratings
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57

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3.80 avg rating — 225,533 ratings
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57

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3.97 avg rating — 709,004 ratings
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59

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4.31 avg rating — 270,047 ratings
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60

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4.25 avg rating — 364,376 ratings
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61

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4.04 avg rating — 662,792 ratings
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61

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4.07 avg rating — 141,499 ratings
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63

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4.17 avg rating — 1,292,488 ratings
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64

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4.16 avg rating — 238,109 ratings
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65

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4.30 avg rating — 273,443 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 478,318 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,179 ratings
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4.03 avg rating — 160,132 ratings
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3.83 avg rating — 609,892 ratings
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4.33 avg rating — 425,820 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 550,745 ratings
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4.08 avg rating — 271,416 ratings
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3.79 avg rating — 230,949 ratings
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3.82 avg rating — 178,558 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 875,511 ratings
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77

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3.96 avg rating — 182,462 ratings
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77

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4.42 avg rating — 584,511 ratings
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3.86 avg rating — 194,113 ratings
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80

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4.34 avg rating — 620,133 ratings
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81

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4.47 avg rating — 401,355 ratings
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82

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3.80 avg rating — 276,350 ratings
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4.55 avg rating — 476,293 ratings
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84

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4.33 avg rating — 1,109,833 ratings
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4.18 avg rating — 494,526 ratings
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4.57 avg rating — 238,447 ratings
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3.80 avg rating — 872,156 ratings
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really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 128,059 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 164,690 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 443,812 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 181,260 ratings
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4.29 avg rating — 505,254 ratings
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93

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3.83 avg rating — 1,335,460 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 464,890 ratings
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95

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3.94 avg rating — 545,742 ratings
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96

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3.92 avg rating — 1,016,274 ratings
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4.09 avg rating — 387,189 ratings
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98

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4.19 avg rating — 212,467 ratings
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4.35 avg rating — 647,806 ratings
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3.93 avg rating — 123,022 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 11541 books
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Fiona 1668 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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