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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4.47 avg rating — 3,061,359 ratings
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4.27 avg rating — 1,171,557 ratings
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3.93 avg rating — 788,934 ratings
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4.37 avg rating — 3,720,636 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 159,736 ratings
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3.91 avg rating — 237,665 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 737,817 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 229,656 ratings
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4.30 avg rating — 333,868 ratings
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4.33 avg rating — 280,787 ratings
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29

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3.78 avg rating — 245,785 ratings
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30

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4.09 avg rating — 516,955 ratings
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4.11 avg rating — 803,609 ratings
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32

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4.33 avg rating — 352,139 ratings
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33

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3.87 avg rating — 259,601 ratings
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34

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4.36 avg rating — 283,110 ratings
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35

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4.03 avg rating — 1,011,838 ratings
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36

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4.34 avg rating — 390,521 ratings
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36

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4.14 avg rating — 373,894 ratings
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38

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3.62 avg rating — 154,458 ratings
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39

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4.44 avg rating — 194,066 ratings
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40

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4.13 avg rating — 214,186 ratings
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41

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4.35 avg rating — 264,131 ratings
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42

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4.12 avg rating — 531,515 ratings
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4.02 avg rating — 180,365 ratings
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3.80 avg rating — 279,343 ratings
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4.44 avg rating — 167,896 ratings
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3.92 avg rating — 1,370,463 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 318,166 ratings
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4.34 avg rating — 188,438 ratings
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51

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3.88 avg rating — 1,024,853 ratings
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52

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3.93 avg rating — 167,981 ratings
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53

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3.99 avg rating — 896,779 ratings
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53

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4.10 avg rating — 351,179 ratings
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55

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3.75 avg rating — 420,433 ratings
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56

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4.31 avg rating — 688,561 ratings
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57

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4.01 avg rating — 178,004 ratings
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58

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3.80 avg rating — 226,054 ratings
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58

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3.97 avg rating — 714,858 ratings
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60

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4.31 avg rating — 284,493 ratings
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61

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4.25 avg rating — 367,934 ratings
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62

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4.04 avg rating — 668,863 ratings
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62

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4.07 avg rating — 143,134 ratings
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64

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4.17 avg rating — 1,319,726 ratings
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65

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4.16 avg rating — 242,166 ratings
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66

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4.30 avg rating — 281,940 ratings
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4.39 avg rating — 180,757 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 486,631 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 158,645 ratings
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3.83 avg rating — 620,319 ratings
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4.34 avg rating — 434,000 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 571,730 ratings
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4.08 avg rating — 275,780 ratings
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3.79 avg rating — 235,303 ratings
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3.82 avg rating — 180,669 ratings
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77

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4.30 avg rating — 884,269 ratings
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78

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3.96 avg rating — 184,175 ratings
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4.42 avg rating — 591,033 ratings
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80

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3.86 avg rating — 195,980 ratings
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81

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4.34 avg rating — 660,534 ratings
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82

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4.47 avg rating — 417,312 ratings
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4.55 avg rating — 482,517 ratings
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84

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4.33 avg rating — 1,136,969 ratings
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4.18 avg rating — 499,285 ratings
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4.59 avg rating — 263,287 ratings
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3.80 avg rating — 886,057 ratings
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3.99 avg rating — 129,851 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 165,768 ratings
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4.01 avg rating — 272,275 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 453,196 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 183,048 ratings
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4.29 avg rating — 523,846 ratings
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3.83 avg rating — 1,346,321 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 491,529 ratings
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96

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3.94 avg rating — 554,892 ratings
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3.92 avg rating — 1,033,641 ratings
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98

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4.09 avg rating — 390,676 ratings
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4.19 avg rating — 215,092 ratings
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4.35 avg rating — 684,610 ratings
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176 books · 31 voters · list created December 21st, 2020 by Mitchell Friedman (votes) .
6 likes · 
Lists are re-scored approximately every 5 minutes.


Mitchell 11156 books
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Fiona 1699 books
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Rich 85376 books
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Charlotte Igelkott 3166 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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