historical fiction

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What Once Was Promised by Louis Trubiano

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What Once Was Promised by Louis Trubiano

What One Was Promised is a multi-generational family saga that chronicles the diverse paths taken by three young Italian immigrants and one American-born Italian as they navigate the challenges presented them in early 20th century Boston. Love, friendship, treachery and betrayal are intertwined against a backdrop of political intrigue and decades long personal vendettas. In the end, the four old friends must come together to right a wrong visited upon them by those who have spent a lifetime fighting against them.

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Sons of the Sphinx by Cheryl Carpinello

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Sons of the Sphinx by Cheryl Carpinello

He has been given back his human form. Allowed to return one last time to restore honor to his family. One last time to find his true love.
Rosa, who hears the dead, is summoned to solve a mystery in 1330 BC Egypt. To discover the truth. To stay alive.
Thrilling time travel. Gripping action. Unforgettable characters.
Edge of your seat story of battling good and evil in an ancient world.

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Abroad: A Novel of Cross-Cultural Encounters by Greyson Bryan

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Abroad: A Novel of Cross-Cultural Encounters by Greyson Bryan

Come along for the ride with this “supremely readable” coming-of-age story about clashing cultures and complicated relationships. ABROAD follows Skip, Maddie, and Rex as they travel overseas and navigate romantic loves and friendships during the cultural upheaval and sexual revolution of the 1960s and 70s.

Booklife praises ABROAD saying, “In this literary novel centered on travel and the lessons we can learn from crossing borders with an open heart, Bryan, author of the Big thriller series, weaves an ambitious, globe-crossing narrative of interconnected lives and loves.”

Travel to Mexico and Paris, take a steamship to Europe, crisscross Japan, Taiwan and Indonesia all in one story. Read ABROAD and bring adventure with you wherever you go.

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The Oldest Word by Johnny Firic

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The Oldest Word by Johnny Firic

The story opens with the discovery of a mysterious box from the distant past. Its makers are five orphaned friends who hope to help civilizational knowledge survive disruptive climate change centuries in the future: the ending of the Ice Age. The bar is continuously raised as the box traverses more than a dozen settings to the present day. Readers are tacitly encouraged to partner with the author and fill in the blanks by considering their metaphorical boxes, lessons for the future from their past.

Exchanges between cultures and generations highlight human transience. Adoption is the preeminent motif, many characters being orphaned, or having adopted, or both. Nature’s agency is felt throughout the story, with animals, plants and landscapes presented as respected partners rather than resources to be exploited. Nothing can fully reconcile human contradictions, and true equilibrium must come from a transcendent perspective. Plural identity followed by association with all humans, past, present and future, is only a good start. Can we progress beyond all life forms? The book ends on the question: what can you do but hope?

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The Oldest Word by Johnny Firic

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The Oldest Word by Johnny Firic

“Plural identity is where respectful practice begins.”
Who are you? Just the one body and mind? Does your story begin with your birth? Or how far back would you go?

The Oldest Word spans ten thousand years and more than a dozen settings. Human contradictions are reconciled time and again, with tragedy and humor feeding off each other. From the twin mirror mazes of history and psychology, amid ever-shifting social and natural landscapes, enduring patterns emerge.

The story opens with the discovery of a mysterious box from the distant past. Its makers are five orphaned friends who hope to help civilizational knowledge survive disruptive climate change centuries in the future: the ending of the Ice Age. The bar is continuously raised as the box travels through space and time to the present day. Readers are tacitly encouraged to partner with the author and fill in the blanks by considering their metaphorical boxes, lessons for the future from their past.

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Lafitte’s Chance by Michael Roberts

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Lafitte’s Chance by Michael Roberts

Thomas Cain puts it all on the line again in this exhilarating alternative American History time travel adventure novel! Thomas has managed to rescue Aden, but his futuristic gear is still missing while the Pirate King, Jean Lafitte, is breathing down his neck.

In his efforts to track his items down, will Thomas keep his agreement to bring the pirates to Jackson’s aid and achieve America’s first victory as a new country? Or will pride bring them all to defeat?

Aden is safe for the most part, and now Thomas must retrieve his missing weapons and gear. In doing so, he’s made an enemy of the Pirate King, Jean Lafitte, and his associates, and now he must trudge through the marshes of the Mississippi to follow them, find his missing Webley and vest, and make it back in time to meet up with Jackson.

Just when Thomas thinks that he’s managed to find his missing gear, he learns that not only has Lafitte’s wastrel brother Pierre absconded with the gear, but he’s left Jean Lafitte ready to hang.

In a last ditch effort to find Pierre, Thomas must make a deal with the devil himself and bring the villainous, once-reputable now-Pirate Queen Lady Theodosia with him to locate Pierre and his weapons, and make sure the pirates don’t hang for their offenses. Will the enemy of his enemy become his friend?

Another impossible task, or so it seems. But can the Pale Rider rise to the occasion once more, save the lives of hundreds, and keep his own neck out of a noose?

Lafitte’s Chance is the fifth book in the Pale Rider series, an alternate American Historical Military retelling, and is the next book in the trilogy set that focuses on the War of 1812. If you like American historical fiction, time travel, and alternate history, then discover Lafitte’s Chance today! ** it is recommended that the books are read in order! **

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The Maiden of the Storm by Michelle Deerwester-Dalrymple

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The Maiden of the Storm by Michelle Deerwester-Dalrymple

When the power of love is stronger than the chains of bondage . . .

She’s a powerful Scottish Highland Celtic woman. He’s a Roman warrior, captive in her village. When their passion for each other grows, can they find a way to be together?

Or will the conflicts between the Celts and Romans drive them apart?

In the Caledonii village, Riana is the chieftain’s oldest daughter and accustomed to position and authority. Until the day a Roman soldier is brought in and made a slave.

Despite her moral objections, she is directed by her father to tend to the Roman, to bring him back to health and make sure he’s fed.

At first, he’s nothing more than a curiosity for her, but as they spend time together during her duties to him, they forge a camaraderie that quickly becomes something more.

Something passionate and forbidden.

Horatio is a confident Roman soldier brought low after a night of missteps. Bound to slavery for the Caledonii tribe, he spends every waking moment biding his time and planning his escape. What he doesn’t plan is the desire he feels for the very woman directed to keep him in chains.

His desire grows, as does his love for the red northern woman.

As their passions rise, Riana decides that she cannot see the man she loves enslaved. They concoct an escape that is successful on the surface but leads to disastrous results.

When they believe all is lost, their love for each other gives them one final chance for survival. Will their love overcome the obstacles that would tear them apart?

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Beyond the Song by Carol Selick

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Beyond the Song by Carol Selick

“Beyond the Song” is an autobiographical novel, based on the author’s coming of age in the ‘sixties and early ‘seventies. A singer-songwriter like her alter-ego Carol Marks, Carol Selick begins each chapter with lyrics she wrote and still performs today.
There’s a lot of nostalgia for that time period. In many ways, my character’s search for her voice expresses the search of a whole generation of women. The settings in New York and Berkeley, are immediately recognizable. Drugs, sex, and rock ‘ roll provide a provocative landscape for Carol’s journey into womanhood.

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Phantom in the Pines by R.K. Latch

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Phantom in the Pines by R.K. Latch

Henry Lawton is a young man in 1930’s Mississippi. He works for his father in the family moonshining business and is one of the best bootleggers around.

He is secretly in love with the granddaughter of a woman the locals consider a true-to-life witch. So he has plenty to keep him busy.

But, when a relentless federal agent enlists the aid of the corrupt local sheriff, things take a turn for the worse. Lives and families are destroyed.

As the death toll mounts and the situation grows dire, perhaps the only thing that can fight man’s evil is the supernatural.

When the spirit of the trees walks free, evil runs in fear.

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All the Colors of My Soul by Leta McCurry

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All the Colors of My Soul by Leta McCurry

What could drive a loving wife and mother to commit cold-blooded murder?

Growing up in the 1930s Santa Clara Valley, California, Neva Holiday wanted nothing more than to reach eighteen, have a beau, get married and mother a houseful of kids. Simple, quiet, peaceful.

As she blossoms into a young woman during high school, she finds herself torn between a life-long bond with the boy next door and her growing love for a handsome newcomer escaping the destitution of Dust Bowl Oklahoma. Before she can discover the desire of her heart, WWII tears her world apart, plunging her into years of fear and dread of receiving the telegram beginning, “We regret to inform you.”

A son brings joy, purpose and focus to her life until an insidious influence creeps into the family unawares, creating an unspeakable tragedy, forever shattering Neva’s dreams of quiet happiness, and forcing her to confront whether she will turn the other cheek or deliver cold-hearted retribution.

In a dizzying exposé of the human spirit, Leta McCurry weaves a riveting tale of a young woman’s descent into darkness. Emotionally gripping and magnificently crafted, this rich and heart-wrenching novel will keep you on the edge of your seat as you race to its extraordinary conclusion. — Heidi Thomas, Award-winning author of the “Cowboy Dreams” series.

All the Colors of My Soul is a sweeping twentieth-century historical fiction. If you like captivating character studies, poignant moral quandaries, and vivid snapshots of the past, then you’ll love Leta McCurry’s mesmerizing story. — Sally Bates, Award-winning author of Western fiction and poetry.

Targeted Age Group:: 18+
Heat/Violence Level: Heat Level 4 – R Rated

What Inspired You to Write Your Book?
Two tragic family incidents. The situations were similar but the responses of the individuals involved were vastly different. All the Colors of My Soul is not the story of either of those incidents, but was inspired by the different reactions of the human spirit to an unspeakable tragedy.

How Did You Come up With Your Characters?
Characters are always influenced to some degree by people we have known, particularly in childhood for me. Additionally there are those people who appear for an instant and then are gone, the slouched old man sitting on a park bench, his face a road map of life, the thin woman with a smelly infant slung on her hip, the child with the haunted eyes. They speak to me on a primal level and I remember them. I don't pattern characters after any one person, but exposure to all these are the bits and pieces of the mosaic that becomes a new identity in my stories. Beyond that, the stories themselves are a big factor in character development – kind of like the character rises to the occasion.

Book Sample
Inside my chest, my heart slowly expanded until it pushed against the constraints of my ribs and into my throat as if it would flow out and fill the room with something sparkling and golden, but warm and soft. I held my breath, wanting to extend the moment, to fill my hands with the manifestation of my love for him, to smear it on my face and arms, and his, where it would forever color our skin with a lasting testimony of my unspeakable love for him.

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