10 Historical Novels Illuminating Women in 20th Century America

March 13 2023
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It’s Women’s History Month, and there’s no shortage of gripping historical novels to add to your books-to-read shelf if you want a better portrait of womanhood through the years. As a teacher and researcher of American women’s writing, I’m thrilled to offer this list of ten contemporary titles, all featuring at least one strong female lead, that each re-imagine a decade in twentieth-century America. From the gritty and glamorous parties of Gilded Age New York to the shadowy backdoor deals in Cold War Washington, DC, these stories illuminate the ways women have been integral to the transformations—big and small—in American history and culture. Better still, they will introduce you to both unforgettable characters and vivid, unique settings.

For more book recommendations check out Simon & Schuster’s Women’s History Month page!

Vera
by Carol Edgarian

1900s

As a professor of 1800s American literature, I love teaching books that take place at the turn of the century. While we associate it with buttoned-up Victorian values of the previous century, it was an exciting—and terrifying—time of change. VERA illuminates a dark and dangerous world at the start of the twentieth century through the story of Vera Johnson, an illegitimate daughter of San Francisco’s most infamous bordello owner. Her life has always been defined by the violent confines of a family paid to raise her. But after the great quake wrecks the city and transforms it into the underworld of her nightmares, Vera, her innocent sister, and her one-time rival team up to forge a new world.

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Vera
Carol Edgarian

New York Times bestselling author Carol Edgarian delivers “an all-encompassing and enthralling” (Oprah Daily) novel featuring an unforgettable heroine coming of age in the aftermath of catastrophe, and her quest for love and reinvention.

Meet Vera Johnson, fifteen-year-old illegitimate daughter of Rose, notorious proprietor of San Francisco’s most legendary bordello. Vera has grown up straddling two worlds—the madam’s alluring sphere, replete with tickets to the opera, surly henchmen, and scant morality, and the quiet domestic life of the family paid to raise her.

On the morning of the great quake, Vera’s worlds collide. As the city burns and looters vie with the injured, orphaned, and starving, Vera and her guileless sister, Pie, are cast adrift. Disregarding societal norms and prejudices, Vera begins to imagine a new kind of life. She collaborates with Tan, her former rival, and forges an unlikely family of survivors, navigating through the disaster together.

“A character-driven novel about family, power, and loyalty, (San Francisco Chronicle), Vera brings to life legendary characters—tenor Enrico Caruso, indicted mayor Eugene Schmitz and boss Abe Ruef, tabloid celebrity Alma Spreckels. This “brilliantly conceived and beautifully realized” (Booklist, starred review) tale of improbable outcomes and alliances takes hold from the first page, with remarkable scenes of devastation, renewal, and joy. Vera celebrates the audacious fortitude of its young heroine, who discovers an unexpected strength in unprecedented times.

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Cartier's Hope
by M. J. Rose

1910s

From the dark underbelly of the 1900s cityscape to the glittering mansions of the 1910s Gilded Age, CARTIER’S HOPE is a richly seductive mystery about the pursuit of power. This novel’s Vera (Vera Garland) is determined to make it in the male-dominated field of journalism, and her first big break is investigating the rumors that the Hope Diamond’s new owner is trying to manipulate its value. With the help of a young Russian jeweler Vera feels drawn to, she finds herself uncovering a world of corruption disguised by glitz and glamor.

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Cartier's Hope
M. J. Rose

In this “heady tale of romance, intrigue, and empowerment” (Pam Jenoff, New York Times bestselling author) during the Gilded Age, a determined and remarkable female journalist is determined to uncover the truth of the legendary Hope Diamond—from the New York Times bestselling author of Tiffany Blues.

New York, 1910: A city of extravagant balls in Fifth Avenue mansions and poor immigrants crammed into crumbling Lower East Side tenements. A city where the suffrage movement is growing stronger every day, but most women reporters are still delegated to the fashion and lifestyle pages. But Vera Garland is set on making her mark in a man’s world of serious journalism.

Shortly after the world-famous Hope Diamond is acquired for a record sum, Vera begins investigating rumors about schemes by its new owner, jeweler Pierre Cartier, to manipulate its value. Vera is determined to find the truth behind the notorious diamond and its mysterious curses, especially when her reporting puts her in the same orbit as a magazine publisher whose blackmailing schemes led to the death of her beloved father.

Appealing to a young Russian jeweler for help, Vera is unprepared when she begins falling in love with him…and even more unprepared when she gets caught up in his deceptions and finds herself at risk of losing all she has worked so hard to achieve.

“Vivid…[and] memorable” (Publishers Weekly), Cartier’s Hope is “a twisting tale of greed, revenge, and masked identities that put love and lives at risk. A fast-paced historical novel that shines with as much intrigue and mystery as the Hope Diamond itself” (Beatriz Williams, New York Times bestselling author).

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Hang the Moon
by Jeannette Walls

1920s

Sallie Kincaid, the feisty and determined woman at the heart of bestselling writer Jeannette Walls’ HANG THE MOON, has always been a big fish in a small pond. Her father, Duke, is one of the most powerful men in their small town in 1920s Virginia, and Sallie gets her quick wit and daredevil attitude from him. But when Sallie tries to teach her timid half-brother to embrace more risk, and it ends in disaster, Sallie is cast out of the family. Years later, determined to fight her way back into the Big House, Sallie will uncover the dark secrets that have defined her family since before she can remember.

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Hang the Moon
Jeannette Walls

From Jeannette Walls, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Glass Castle, comes a riveting new novel about an indomitable young woman in Virginia during Prohibition.

Most folk thought Sallie Kincaid was a nobody who’d amount to nothing. Sallie had other plans.

Sallie Kincaid is the daughter of the biggest man in a small town, the charismatic Duke Kincaid. Born at the turn of the 20th century into a life of comfort and privilege, Sallie remembers little about her mother who died in a violent argument with the Duke. By the time she is just eight years old, the Duke has remarried and had a son, Eddie. While Sallie is her father’s daughter, sharp-witted and resourceful, Eddie is his mother’s son, timid and cerebral. When Sallie tries to teach young Eddie to be more like their father, her daredevil coaching leads to an accident, and Sallie is cast out.

Nine years later, she returns, determined to reclaim her place in the family. That’s a lot more complicated than Sallie expected, and she enters a world of conflict and lawlessness. Sallie confronts the secrets and scandals that hide in the shadows of the Big House, navigates the factions in the family and town, and finally comes into her own as a bold, sometimes reckless bootlegger.

You will fall in love with Sallie Kincaid, a feisty and fearless, terrified and damaged young woman who refuses to be corralled.

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Mrs. Houdini
by Victoria Kelly

1920s

While Walls shows us the lesser-known small-town life of my favorite twentieth-century decade, I also love reading about the beguiling world of global entertainment, spiritualism, and illusion that peaked in the 1920s. Many people know who Harry Houdini is, but fewer people know the story of his dedicated wife Bess. Despite Harry’s well-known hatred and skepticism about spiritualism, he left his wife a code only they knew with the belief that their love could transcend anything. MRS. HOUDINI flashes back and forth between Bess and Harry’s whirlwind romance and the journey this code takes her on after his death.

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Mrs. Houdini
Victoria Kelly

“Richly lyrical and thought-provoking” (Publishers Weekly, starred review), this “stellar debut from a novelist to watch” (Geraldine Brooks, Pulitzer Prize winning author) explores the passionate marriage of Harry Houdini and his wife, Bess—a love story that defied death itself.

Before escape artist Harry Houdini died, he vowed he would find a way to speak to his beloved wife, Bess, from beyond the grave using a coded message known only to the two of them. But when a widowed Bess begins seeing this code in seemingly impossible places, it becomes clear that Harry has an urgent message to convey. Unlocking the puzzle will set Bess on a course back through the pair’s extraordinary romance, which swept the illusionist and his bride from the beaches of Coney Island, to the palaces of Budapest, to the back lots of Hollywood. When the mystery finally leads Bess to the doorstep of a mysterious young photographer, she realizes that her husband’s magic may have been more than just illusion.

In surprising turns that weave through the uncertain days of the dawn of the twentieth century and continue into the dazzling 1920s, Mrs. Houdini is a “dazzling and enchanting” (Shelf Awareness, starred review) tale, “a marvel that gallops through time and space” (Associated Press), and a “mesmerizing reimagining” (People) of one of history’s greatest love stories.

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Rainwater
by Sandra Brown

1930s

Between singlehandedly running a boardinghouse raising a sensitive but mute son alone, Ella Baron is constantly busy, but she has also always been confident in her ability to shoulder whatever the world throws her way. When a handsome and mysterious new boarder, Mr. Rainwater, shows up, Ella is instantly suspicious. Still, she takes him in after hearing that not only was he a victim of the Great Depression, but he doesn’t have long to live. As racial tensions and financial strains send Ella’s small community spinning, things finally start to slip from her grasp.

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Rainwater
Sandra Brown

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The Diplomat's Daughter
by Karin Tanabe

1940s

In this World War II epic, three young people will face unimaginable choices and circumstances. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Emi, the daughter of a Japanese diplomat, finds herself in a Texas internment camp. There, she meets and falls in love with German-born Christian. But when Emi is sent back to Japan, Christian joins the US Army hoping for a reunion with Emi. As Emi helps her new community stay safe, she can’t stop thinking about Christian as he faces some of the war’s bloodiest battles, and her first love, Leo, a Jewish refuge whose chance encounter in Shanghai with a Nazi has him still running for his life.

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The Diplomat's Daughter
Karin Tanabe

For fans of All the Light We Cannot See and Orphan Train, the author of the “thought-provoking” (Library Journal, starred review) and “must-read” (PopSugar) novel The Gilded Years crafts a captivating tale of three young people divided by the horrors of World War II and their journey back to one another.

During the turbulent months following the 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor, twenty-one-year-old Emi Kato, the daughter of a Japanese diplomat, is locked behind barbed wire in a Texas internment camp. She feels hopeless until she meets handsome young Christian Lange, whose German-born parents were wrongfully arrested for un-American activities. Together, they live as prisoners with thousands of other German and Japanese families, but discover that love can bloom in even the bleakest circumstances.

When Emi and her mother are abruptly sent back to Japan, Christian enlists in the United States Army, with his sights set on the Pacific front—and, he hopes, a reunion with Emi—unaware that her first love, Leo Hartmann, the son of wealthy of Austrian parents and now a Jewish refugee in Shanghai, may still have her heart.

Fearful of bombings in Tokyo, Emi’s parents send her to a remote resort town in the mountains, where many in the foreign community have fled. Cut off from her family, struggling with growing depression and hunger, Emi repeatedly risks her life to help keep her community safe—all while wondering if the two men she loves are still alive.

As Christian Lange struggles to adapt to life as a soldier, his unit pushes its way from the South Pacific to Okinawa, where one of the bloodiest battles of World War II awaits them. Meanwhile, in Japanese-occupied Shanghai, as Leo fights to survive the squalor of the Jewish ghetto, a surprise confrontation with a Nazi officer threatens his life. For each man, Emi Kato is never far from their minds.

Flung together by war, passion, and extraordinary acts of selflessness, the paths of these three remarkable young people will collide as the fighting on the Pacific front crescendos. With her “elegant and extremely gratifying” (USA TODAY) storytelling, Karin Tanabe paints a stunning portrait of a turning point in history.

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The House of Eve
by Sadeqa Johnson

1950s

In Philadelphia, fifteen-year-old Ruby is determined to become the first person in her family to attend college. But a taboo romance threatens to tug her back to the life she came from. Meanwhile, in Washington, DC, Eleanor falls in love with a man at Howard University who can give her the life she wants. But to impress his family, longstanding members of the city’s Black elite, she must have a baby and cope with the challenges of motherhood. HOUSE OF EVE demonstrates how these two women in 1950s America will take risks for ambition and love as their lives overlap in unexpected ways.

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The House of Eve
Sadeqa Johnson

From the award-winning author of Yellow Wife, a daring and redemptive novel set in 1950s Philadelphia and Washington, DC, that explores what it means to be a woman and a mother, and how much one is willing to sacrifice to achieve her greatest goal.

1950s Philadelphia: fifteen-year-old Ruby Pearsall is on track to becoming the first in her family to attend college, in spite of having a mother more interested in keeping a man than raising a daughter. But a taboo love affair threatens to pull her back down into the poverty and desperation that has been passed on to her like a birthright.

Eleanor Quarles arrives in Washington, DC, with ambition and secrets. When she meets the handsome William Pride at Howard University, they fall madly in love. But William hails from one of DC’s elite wealthy Black families, and his par­ents don’t let just anyone into their fold. Eleanor hopes that a baby will make her finally feel at home in William’s family and grant her the life she’s been searching for. But having a baby—and fitting in—is easier said than done.

With their stories colliding in the most unexpected of ways, Ruby and Eleanor will both make decisions that shape the trajectory of their lives.

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Mrs. Everything
by Jennifer Weiner

1960s

In the chaotic transition between the cookie-cutter suburbs of the 1950s to the social and cultural revolutions of the 1960s, two sisters struggle to find their individual paths. Jo, the uncompromising intellectual, emerges from the upheaval with a conservative, suburban life. Meanwhile, her girlish, traditional sister still hasn’t left the counterculture of the '60s behind. Witty, ambitious, and moving, beloved storyteller Jennifer Weiner’s novel will appeal to generations of readers as it explores the power of expectation versus reality in an ever-changing world.

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Mrs. Everything
Jennifer Weiner

In this instant New York Times bestseller and “multigenerational narrative that’s nothing short of brilliant” (People), two sisters’ lives from the 1950s to the present are explored as they struggle to find their places—and be true to themselves—in a rapidly evolving world from #1 New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner.

Jo and Bethie Kaufman were born into a world full of promise.

Growing up in 1950s Detroit, they live in a perfect “Dick and Jane” house, where their roles in the family are clearly defined. Jo is the tomboy, the bookish rebel with a passion to make the world more fair; Bethie is the pretty, feminine good girl, a would-be star who enjoys the power her beauty confers and dreams of a traditional life.

But the truth ends up looking different from what the girls imagined. Jo and Bethie survive traumas and tragedies. As their lives unfold against the background of free love and Vietnam, Woodstock and women’s lib, Bethie becomes an adventure-loving wild child who dives headlong into the counterculture and is up for anything (except settling down). Meanwhile, Jo becomes a proper young mother in Connecticut, a witness to the changing world instead of a participant. Neither woman inhabits the world she dreams of, nor has a life that feels authentic or brings her joy. Is it too late for the women to finally stake a claim on happily ever after?

In “her most sprawling and intensely personal novel to date” (Entertainment Weekly), Jennifer Weiner tells a “simply unputdownable” (Good Housekeeping) story of two sisters who, with their different dreams and different paths, offer answers to the question: How should a woman be in the world?

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American Spy
by Lauren Wilkinson

1980s

In the bureaucratic deluge of the 1980s, Marie is tired of paperwork in what she thought would be an exciting job with the FBI. When an opportunity arises for her to join a task force aimed at bringing down Thomas Sankara, the Communist president of Burkina Faso, she jumps at the opportunity to prove herself. But as Marie turns spy and becomes Sankara’s lover, she begins to see that her own ideology aligns more with his than with her employer’s. Lauren Wilkinson’s novel is a poignant family drama, passionate romance, and bracing Cold War spy thriller, all in one.

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American Spy
Lauren Wilkinson

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