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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4.31 avg rating — 1,964,520 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 1,150,501 ratings
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4.47 avg rating — 3,011,176 ratings
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4.65 avg rating — 2,072,774 ratings
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3.93 avg rating — 779,522 ratings
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4.41 avg rating — 211,751 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 1,255,236 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,034,203 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,418 ratings
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3.91 avg rating — 232,614 ratings
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4.37 avg rating — 3,602,480 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 226,447 ratings
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4.14 avg rating — 394,505 ratings
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4.11 avg rating — 1,697,654 ratings
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4.39 avg rating — 2,867,127 ratings
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4.35 avg rating — 827,730 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,823,175 ratings
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4.30 avg rating — 317,785 ratings
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4.32 avg rating — 275,110 ratings
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4.10 avg rating — 282,220 ratings
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4.39 avg rating — 330,172 ratings
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3.79 avg rating — 240,991 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 716,773 ratings
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4.09 avg rating — 512,609 ratings
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30

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4.11 avg rating — 791,950 ratings
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4.32 avg rating — 346,371 ratings
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32

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4.16 avg rating — 2,314,517 ratings
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32

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3.87 avg rating — 254,591 ratings
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34

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4.37 avg rating — 275,642 ratings
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35

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4.03 avg rating — 991,379 ratings
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36

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4.34 avg rating — 384,363 ratings
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36

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4.14 avg rating — 358,076 ratings
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38

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3.62 avg rating — 152,555 ratings
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39

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4.44 avg rating — 191,286 ratings
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40

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4.13 avg rating — 212,703 ratings
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4.35 avg rating — 254,191 ratings
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42

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4.11 avg rating — 518,342 ratings
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4.02 avg rating — 172,658 ratings
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4.36 avg rating — 268,603 ratings
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4.44 avg rating — 165,366 ratings
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3.92 avg rating — 1,354,746 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 314,758 ratings
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4.34 avg rating — 182,662 ratings
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3.88 avg rating — 1,010,376 ratings
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51

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3.93 avg rating — 166,981 ratings
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52

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3.99 avg rating — 885,058 ratings
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52

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4.10 avg rating — 346,213 ratings
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54

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3.74 avg rating — 411,449 ratings
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55

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4.32 avg rating — 663,109 ratings
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56

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4.01 avg rating — 174,960 ratings
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57

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3.80 avg rating — 225,524 ratings
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57

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3.97 avg rating — 708,906 ratings
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59

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4.31 avg rating — 269,812 ratings
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60

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4.25 avg rating — 364,312 ratings
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61

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4.04 avg rating — 662,648 ratings
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61

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4.07 avg rating — 141,464 ratings
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63

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4.17 avg rating — 1,291,648 ratings
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4.16 avg rating — 238,052 ratings
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65

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4.30 avg rating — 273,263 ratings
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4.38 avg rating — 176,936 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 478,158 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,126 ratings
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4.03 avg rating — 160,114 ratings
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3.83 avg rating — 609,625 ratings
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4.33 avg rating — 425,643 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 550,311 ratings
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4.08 avg rating — 271,316 ratings
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3.79 avg rating — 230,861 ratings
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3.82 avg rating — 178,513 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 875,303 ratings
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77

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3.96 avg rating — 182,422 ratings
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77

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4.42 avg rating — 584,392 ratings
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3.86 avg rating — 194,073 ratings
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80

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4.34 avg rating — 619,362 ratings
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81

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4.47 avg rating — 401,054 ratings
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82

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3.80 avg rating — 276,296 ratings
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4.55 avg rating — 476,173 ratings
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84

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4.33 avg rating — 1,109,025 ratings
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4.18 avg rating — 494,397 ratings
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4.57 avg rating — 238,063 ratings
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3.80 avg rating — 871,773 ratings
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really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 128,030 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 164,680 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 443,593 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 181,229 ratings
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4.29 avg rating — 504,829 ratings
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3.83 avg rating — 1,335,215 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 464,333 ratings
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3.94 avg rating — 545,512 ratings
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3.92 avg rating — 1,015,778 ratings
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4.09 avg rating — 387,135 ratings
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4.19 avg rating — 212,405 ratings
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4.35 avg rating — 647,049 ratings
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3.93 avg rating — 122,974 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 11535 books
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Fiona 1667 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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