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 — 1,965,604 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 1,150,818 ratings
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4.47 avg rating — 3,012,187 ratings
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4.36 avg rating — 3,480,649 ratings
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4.65 avg rating — 2,075,263 ratings
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3.93 avg rating — 779,650 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 6,857,780 ratings
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4.41 avg rating — 211,796 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 1,727,982 ratings
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4.16 avg rating — 2,106,710 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 1,255,398 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,035,341 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,446 ratings
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3.91 avg rating — 232,674 ratings
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4.37 avg rating — 3,604,951 ratings
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4.26 avg rating — 226,487 ratings
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4.14 avg rating — 394,586 ratings
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4.11 avg rating — 1,698,017 ratings
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4.39 avg rating — 2,868,244 ratings
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20

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4.35 avg rating — 827,981 ratings
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3.90 avg rating — 2,824,323 ratings
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4.30 avg rating — 317,925 ratings
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4.32 avg rating — 275,183 ratings
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4.19 avg rating — 808,599 ratings
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25

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4.10 avg rating — 282,260 ratings
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26

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4.39 avg rating — 330,222 ratings
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27

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3.79 avg rating — 241,019 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 717,006 ratings
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29

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4.09 avg rating — 512,681 ratings
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30

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4.11 avg rating — 792,071 ratings
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31

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4.32 avg rating — 346,442 ratings
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32

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4.16 avg rating — 2,315,289 ratings
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32

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3.87 avg rating — 254,626 ratings
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34

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4.37 avg rating — 275,726 ratings
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35

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4.03 avg rating — 991,590 ratings
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36

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4.34 avg rating — 384,427 ratings
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36

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4.14 avg rating — 358,204 ratings
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38

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3.62 avg rating — 152,569 ratings
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39

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4.44 avg rating — 191,327 ratings
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40

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4.13 avg rating — 212,719 ratings
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41

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4.35 avg rating — 254,325 ratings
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42

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4.11 avg rating — 518,463 ratings
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4.02 avg rating — 172,779 ratings
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4.36 avg rating — 268,652 ratings
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45

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4.10 avg rating — 1,479,352 ratings
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46

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4.44 avg rating — 165,403 ratings
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3.92 avg rating — 1,355,001 ratings
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48

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4.05 avg rating — 314,786 ratings
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4.34 avg rating — 182,723 ratings
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50

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3.88 avg rating — 1,010,588 ratings
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51

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3.93 avg rating — 166,983 ratings
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52

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3.99 avg rating — 885,168 ratings
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52

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4.10 avg rating — 346,254 ratings
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54

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3.74 avg rating — 411,529 ratings
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55

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4.32 avg rating — 663,409 ratings
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56

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4.01 avg rating — 174,997 ratings
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57

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3.80 avg rating — 225,526 ratings
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57

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3.97 avg rating — 708,960 ratings
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59

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4.31 avg rating — 269,929 ratings
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60

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4.25 avg rating — 364,341 ratings
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61

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4.04 avg rating — 662,715 ratings
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61

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4.07 avg rating — 141,483 ratings
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63

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4.17 avg rating — 1,292,049 ratings
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64

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4.16 avg rating — 238,077 ratings
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65

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4.30 avg rating — 273,354 ratings
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66

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4.38 avg rating — 176,976 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 478,230 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 156,157 ratings
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4.03 avg rating — 160,119 ratings
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3.83 avg rating — 609,760 ratings
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4.33 avg rating — 425,735 ratings
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4.04 avg rating — 550,525 ratings
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4.08 avg rating — 271,371 ratings
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74

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3.79 avg rating — 230,902 ratings
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75

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3.82 avg rating — 178,538 ratings
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4.31 avg rating — 875,413 ratings
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77

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3.96 avg rating — 182,443 ratings
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77

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4.42 avg rating — 584,458 ratings
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79

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3.86 avg rating — 194,096 ratings
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80

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4.34 avg rating — 619,762 ratings
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81

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4.47 avg rating — 401,202 ratings
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82

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3.80 avg rating — 276,321 ratings
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83

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4.55 avg rating — 476,242 ratings
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84

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4.33 avg rating — 1,109,437 ratings
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85

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4.18 avg rating — 494,457 ratings
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86

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4.57 avg rating — 238,238 ratings
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3.80 avg rating — 871,963 ratings
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really liked it 4.00 avg rating — 128,053 ratings
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4.45 avg rating — 164,686 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 443,701 ratings
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4.06 avg rating — 181,242 ratings
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92

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4.29 avg rating — 505,023 ratings
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93

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3.83 avg rating — 1,335,333 ratings
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4.05 avg rating — 464,578 ratings
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95

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3.94 avg rating — 545,619 ratings
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96

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3.92 avg rating — 1,016,012 ratings
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97

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4.09 avg rating — 387,162 ratings
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98

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4.19 avg rating — 212,438 ratings
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99

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4.35 avg rating — 647,418 ratings
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100

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3.93 avg rating — 123,001 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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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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