Let’s hear it for the home school moms!
It takes a great deal of time, planning, and energy to home school your children so bravo to you! No matter what grade you are teaching, historical fiction is a fantastic way for you as a parent to unwind with a good book all the while reigniting your own passion and knowledge about history. So, let a little historical fiction get your creative teaching juices flowing.
Here are a few titles to get you started!
Kristin Hannah’s The Four Winds will take you deep into the 1930’s dust bowl where you will be immersed in the realities of life during a time our history lessons so often skip over.
“My land tells its story if you listen. The story of our family.”
Texas, 1921. A time of abundance. The Great War is over, the bounty of the land is plentiful, and America is on the brink of a new and optimistic era. But for Elsa Wolcott, deemed too old to marry in a time when marriage is a woman’s only option, the future seems bleak. Until the night she meets Rafe Martinelli and decides to change the direction of her life. With her reputation in ruin, there is only one respectable choice: marriage to a man she barely knows.
By 1934, the world has changed; millions are out of work and drought has devastated the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as crops fail and water dries up and the earth cracks open. Dust storms roll relentlessly across the plains. Everything on the Martinelli farm is dying, including Elsa’s tenuous marriage; each day is a desperate battle against nature and a fight to keep her children alive.
In this uncertain and perilous time, Elsa—like so many of her neighbors—must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or leave it behind and go west, to California, in search of a better life for her family.
The Four Winds is a rich, sweeping novel that stunningly brings to life the Great Depression and the people who lived through it—the harsh realities that divided us as a nation and the enduring battle between the haves and the have-nots. A testament to hope, resilience, and the strength of the human spirit to survive adversity, The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation.
The Rose Code by Kate Quinn is sure to open the door to Bletchley Park during WWII. Inspire your daughters and your sons with the technology and code breaking talents of the day. This novel offers a bit of intrigue, a little romance, and a whole lot of insight into what happened at Bletchley Park.
1940. As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very different women answer the call to mysterious country estate Bletchley Park, where the best minds in Britain train to break German military codes. Vivacious debutante Osla is the girl who has everything—beauty, wealth, and the dashing Prince Philip of Greece sending her roses—but she burns to prove herself as more than a society girl, and puts her fluent German to use as a translator of decoded enemy secrets. Imperious self-made Mab, product of east-end London poverty, works the legendary codebreaking machines as she conceals old wounds and looks for a socially advantageous husband. Both Osla and Mab are quick to see the potential in local village spinster Beth, whose shyness conceals a brilliant facility with puzzles, and soon Beth spreads her wings as one of the Park’s few female cryptanalysts. But war, loss, and the impossible pressure of secrecy will tear the three apart.
1947. As the royal wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip whips post-war Britain into a fever, three friends-turned-enemies are reunited by a mysterious encrypted letter–the key to which lies buried in the long-ago betrayal that destroyed their friendship and left one of them confined to an asylum. A mysterious traitor has emerged from the shadows of their Bletchley Park past, and now Osla, Mab, and Beth must resurrect their old alliance and crack one last code together. But each petal they remove from the rose code brings danger–and their true enemy–closer…
The Paris Library by Janet Skeslien Charles is not only beautifully written but also a nugget of American history taking place in Paris during the occupation of WWII. If you have avid readers among you, this is one novel you’ll want to dive into so you can pass on the importance of books, libraries, and community, especially in the most dire of times.
Paris, 1939: Young and ambitious Odile Souchet seems to have the perfect life with her handsome police officer beau and a dream job at the American Library in Paris. When the Nazis march into the city, Odile stands to lose everything she holds dear, including her beloved library. Together with her fellow librarians, Odile joins the Resistance with the best weapons she has: books. But when the war finally ends, instead of freedom, Odile tastes the bitter sting of unspeakable betrayal.
Montana, 1983: Lily is a lonely teenager looking for adventure in small-town Montana. Her interest is piqued by her solitary, elderly neighbor. As Lily uncovers more about her neighbor’s mysterious past, she finds that they share a love of language, the same longings, and the same intense jealousy, never suspecting that a dark secret from the past connects them.
Unsettled Shores by Kelsey Gietl is a World War I novel featuring a clandestine mail letter operation throughout Europe. Deeply intriguing, this novel offers insight into a region and a war that I found quite illuminating, while chilling me to the core on occasion.
Weary from London’s air raids and the loss of her father at the Battle of the Somme, Josie Harrington wonders if The Great War will ever end. Determined to bring hope to her country’s bleak existence, she joins an underground postal service, delivering soldiers’ letters in order to avoid censorship on both sides of the line.
After being driven from their home under false accusations, German-American Amara Kisch has finally found peace with her new husband, Emil. But when she receives a desperate letter from her brother fighting overseas, it turns her quiet life upside down and leaves her with more fears than assurances.
As Amara sets out to learn the truth about her brother, she finds herself drawn into Josie’s secret world, discovering that sometimes the most difficult battles are the ones fought within yourself.
From the outskirts of New York to the air-raided streets of London, from the French countryside to its German-occupied villages, Unsettled Shores is a story of love, redemption, and the enduring power of hope.
The Ragged Edge of Night by Olivia Hawker offers an informative glimpse into life in Germany during WWII. Based on the true story of author’s family history, this tale speaks to the heart of how German residents were trapped in their own country, fearing for their safety while quietly resisting in the only ways they knew how.
Germany, 1942. Franciscan friar Anton Starzmann is stripped of his place in the world when his school is seized by the Nazis. He relocates to a small German hamlet to wed Elisabeth Herter, a widow who seeks a marriage—in name only—to a man who can help raise her three children. Anton seeks something too—atonement for failing to protect his young students from the wrath of the Nazis. But neither he nor Elisabeth expects their lives to be shaken once again by the inescapable rumble of war.
As Anton struggles to adapt to the roles of husband and father, he learns of the Red Orchestra, an underground network of resisters plotting to assassinate Hitler. Despite Elisabeth’s reservations, Anton joins this army of shadows. But when the SS discovers his schemes, Anton will embark on a final act of defiance that may cost him his life—even if it means saying goodbye to the family he has come to love more than he ever believed possible.
All That Was by Tanya E Williams
Separated by a century. Bonded by loss. Will examining all that was invoke comfort or calamity?
Seattle, 2015. Emily Reed refuses to dwell on her emotions. When the first-year attorney is assigned a church archival project, she dives into the records to hide from her own heartache. But when she discovers her parents were married in this very chapel, she is forced to confront the grief she buried a decade ago.
After she died in 1935, Elizabet Thomas was devastated when her beloved husband wasn’t waiting for her on the other side. A lost soul, she’s wandered their church for the past eighty years, desperate to find him. And now she must persuade a young, living lawyer that the historic building needs to be preserved rather than sold and torn down.
Discovering a diary among the disarray in the building’s basement, Emily is first engrossed and then moved by the dead woman’s words. And as the fate of her home unravels, Elizabet realizes she and the grieving archivist have more in common than she ever would have guessed.
Can Emily and Elizabet save themselves and their cherished sanctuary?
All That Was is an uplifting standalone women’s literary fiction novel deeply woven with historical elements. If you enjoy dual-perspective storylines, complex female characters, and the rekindling of lost hope, then you’ll love Tanya E Williams’s soul-stirring tale.
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