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Blending historical fact with fiction, a novel set in other times and places can transport you into the past more convincingly than a dry historical treatise - and entertain you in the bargain. What I look for in historical fiction are books by authors who, after reading the histories and doing the research, create stories based in the past that include characters I want to know better and a plot that keeps me turning pages - books like Peter Ackroyd's The Clerkenwell Tales, Bernard Cornwell's The Last Kingdom, and Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth.

Now you can spend less time searching and more time reading as I watch for new historical fiction in the Kindle Store so you don't have to. New on the historical fiction shelves:

Acceptable Loss by Anne Perry. Ballantine Books, 2011. Print Length: 320 p. TIME FRAME: Victorian London. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (6 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99; Hardcover $17.16. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
"...Perry’s new William and Hester Monk story, a mesmerizing masterpiece of innocence and evil on London’s docks, outshines all her previous novels in this successful and beloved series. When the body of a small-time crook named Mickey Parfitt washes up on the tide, no one grieves; far from it. But William Monk, commander of the River Police, is puzzled by the expensive silk cravat used to strangle Parfitt. How did this elegant scarf - whose original owner was obviously a man of substance - end up imbedded in the neck of a wharf rat who richly deserved his sordid end? ...colorful characters, a memorable portrait of waterfront life, and a story that achieves its most thrilling moments in a transfixed London courtroom, where Monk faces his old friend Oliver Rathbone in a trial of nearly unbearable tension - in sum, every delectable drop of the rich pleasure that readers expect from an Anne Perry novel." - Publisher.

Becoming Marie Antoinette by Juliet Grey. Ballantine Books, 2011. Print Length: 480 p. TIME FRAME: 18th century Austria and France. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (31 reviews). Kindle edition $9.99; Paperback $10.20. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"Raised alongside her numerous brothers and sisters by the formidable empress of Austria, ten-year-old Maria Antonia knew that her idyllic existence would one day be sacrificed to her mother’s political ambitions. What she never anticipated was that the day in question would come so soon. Before she can journey from sunlit picnics with her sisters in Vienna to the glitter, glamour, and gossip of Versailles, Antonia must change everything about herself in order to be accepted as dauphine of France and the wife of the awkward teenage boy who will one day be Louis XVI. Yet nothing can prepare her for the ingenuity and influence it will take to become queen. Filled with smart history, treacherous rivalries, lavish clothes, and sparkling jewels, Becoming Marie Antoinette will utterly captivate fiction and history lovers alike." - from the trade paperback edition.

Russka: The Novel of Russia by Edward Rutherfurd. Ballantine Books, 2011. Print Length: 960 p. TIME FRAME: Russia - 2nd century A.D. through 20th century. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (74 reviews). Kindle edition $8.99; Paperback $8.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. First published in 1991, Russka is newly available in a Kindle edition. Two more of the author's sweeping historical novels - London and Sarum: The Novel of England - are scheduled for Kindle publication in September 2011.

"With his second sprawling historical novel, Rutherfurd moves from his hometown of Salisbury, England, the site of the bestselling Sarum , to the rich foreign soil of Russia. Though the structure and style mirror that of his first saga, Rutherfurd's close observation of Russia's religious and ethnic diversity give this epic a distinctive flavor. Focusing on the changing fortunes of the small town of Russka and its controlling families, Rutherfurd moves from the tribes of the steppes in the second century A.D. through Cossacks, Tatars, Tsars, revolution and Stalin to touch on a contemporary Russian emigre community near New York City..." - Publishers Weekly.

To Die For: A Novel of Anne Boleyn by Sandra Byrd. Howard Books, 2011. Print Length: 352 p. TIME FRAME: 16th century England. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (16 reviews). Kindle edition $9.99. Text-to-Speech: Disabled.

"To Die For is the story of Meg Wyatt, pledged forever as the best friend to Anne Boleyn since their childhoods on neighboring manors in Kent. When Anne’s star begins to ascend, of course she takes her best friend Meg along for the ride. Life in the court of Henry VIII is thrilling at first, but as Anne’s favor rises and falls, so does Meg’s. And though she’s pledged her loyalty to Anne no matter what the test, Meg just might lose her greatest love - and her own life - because of it. Though much of Meg’s story is fictionalized, it is drawn from known facts. The Wyatt family and the Boleyn family were neighbors and friends, and perhaps even distant cousins. Meg’s brother, Thomas Wyatt, wooed Anne Boleyn and ultimately came very close to the axe blade for it. Two Wyatt sisters attended Anne at her death, and at her death, she gave one of them her jeweled prayer book... " - Publisher.

City of Promise, by Beverly Swerling. Simon & Schuster, 2011. Print length: 432 p. TIME FRAME: New York City in the 1860s. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (5 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99; Hardcover $17.16. Text-to-Speech: Disabled. Following City of Dreams, City of Glory, and City of God, this is the fourth novel in Swerling's sweeping saga of two Manhattan family dynasties - the Turners and the Devreys.

"It is 1864. The South’s surrender is inevitable, and Manhattan is at the heart of the recovering nation’s surge to prosperity...Joshua Turner returns home from the War with only one leg, but his ambition intact, and sees opportunity in the exponential growth of vital city workers - the managers and clerks who churn New York’s economic life. He aspires to build the city’s first apartment houses for everyman, a daring vision that will make him New York's first true real estate titan but will also attract the dangerous attention of a shadowy figure from Josh’s days in a notorious Confederate prison. Meanwhile, the irresistible and clever Mollie Brannigan, raised by her extraordinary Auntie Eileen in perhaps the toniest bordello in town, is resigned at age twenty-two to spinsterhood...till Joshua finds her at Macy’s, the city’s largest emporium, and takes her coaching in Central Park... Vividly imagined and awash in period detail and the unforgettable characters that only Beverly Swerling can conjure, City of Promise delivers a historical adventure of suspense and intrigue, daring plot twists and bitter rivalries, and the captivating love story of two people struggling to forge their own destiny. " - Publisher.

Ride the Wind by Lucia St. Clair Robson. Ballantine Books, 2011. Print Length: 608 p. TIME FRAME: 19th century Texas. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (142 reviews). Kindle edition $7.99; Paperback $7.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. Ride the Wind was first published in 1982 and is newly available in a Kindle edition.

"In 1836, when she was nine years old, Cynthia Ann Parker was kidnapped by Comanche Indians. This is the story of how she grew up with them, mastered their ways, married one of their leaders, and became, in every way, a Comanche woman. It is also the story of a proud and innocent people whose lives pulsed with the very heartbeat of the land. It is the story of a way of life that is gone forever..." - Publisher.

Holy Warrior: A Novel of Robin Hood by Angus Donald. St. Martin's Griffin, 2011. Print Length: 400 p. TIME FRAME: 12th century England and the route to Jerusalem. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (6 reviews). Kindle edition $9.99; Paperback $10.87. Text-to-Speech: Enabled. This is a continuation of the story begun in the author's Outlaw.

"In 1190 A.D. Richard the Lionheart, the new King of England, has launched his epic crusade to seize Jerusalem from the Saracens. Marching with the vast royal army is Britain’s most famous, most feared, most ferocious warrior: the Outlaw of Nottingham, the Earl of Locksley - Robin Hood himself. With his band of loyal men at his side, Robin cuts a bloody swath on the brutal journey east. Daring and dangerous, he can outwit and outlast any foe - but the battlefields of the Holy Land are the ultimate proving ground. And within Robin’s camp lurks a traitor - a hidden enemy determined to assassinate England’s most dangerous rogue. Richly imagined and furiously paced, featuring a cast of unforgettable characters, Holy Warrior is adventure, history and legend at its finest." - Publisher.

Charlie Mike by Leonard B. Scott. Ballantine Books, 2011. Print Length: 432 p. TIME FRAME: Vietnam War. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (37 reviews). Kindle edition $7.99; Paperback $7.99. Text-to-Speech: Enabled.

"If war may be said to bring out the worst in governments, it frequently brings out the best in people. This is a novel about some of the very best. Some led. Some followed. Some died. Meet Sergeant David Grady, Sarah Boyce, Major John Colven, Lieutenant Le Be Son...in the great Vietnam war novel, Charlie Mike." - Publisher
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Note to readers: The book prices quoted here are the Amazon.com prices in effect at the time of the blog posting. Please follow the links to the individual book to check the current price.