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  • General Recommendations
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The Best Historical Fiction of 2025 for Adults | Multnomah County Library

Recommendations from Multnomah County Library staff. For more of our 2025 Best Books use the link at the end.

User from Multnomah County Library

20 items

  • A very ancient body uncovered in an English bog is the through-line illustrating our struggles with bureaucracy, social tension, political differences, personal anxiety, power dynamics, grief, and the very basic emotion of curiosity. - Emily-Jane D.
    Book, 2025New York, NY : Bloomsbury Publishing, 2025. — FICTION NORTH 2025
  • Are you into toxic lesbian vampires? You’ll sink your teeth into the verdant prose while the audiobook narrators take your breath away. - Liza D
    Book, 2025New York : Tor, Tor Publishing Group, 2025. — SF SCHWAB 2025
  • Stag Dance

    a Novel & Stories

    Peters, Torrey,
    A collection of mostly prior-self published works, all focussing on various anxieties of trans experience. Stag Dance, the new work, charts how gender norms are easily transgressed as a joke, then punished when the transgression becomes real. -…
    Book, 2025New York : Random House, [2025] — FICTION PETERS 2025
  • This deeply feeling (and also very funny) adventure into the heart of the heart of ancient Britain was a true delight. - Phoebe W.
    Book, 2025New York : Orbit, 2025. — FICTION ONEILL 2025
  • This novel, about a young woman who works in a fancy department store in the 1980s, made me feel good about the world AND it made me laugh so hard that at one point, my family came in from another room to see if I'd lost my mind. - Diana A.
    Book, 2025New York : Mariner Books, [2025] — FICTION BLAU 2025
  • Who knew historical fiction could be so hilarious? Simultaneously bawdy and sincere, I loved every turn this book about a young boy plucked from obscurity and told he is destined to be the king of England took. - Yana Y.
    Book, 2025New York, NY : Alfred A. Knopf, 2025. — FICTION HARKIN 2025
  • There are so many scenes in this novel in which you feel the ache of these two women wanting to love each other in the full light of day and having to hide in order to continue having a career in the space program. It's so moving. - Diana A.
    Book, 2025New York, NY : Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, [2025] — FICTION REID 2025
  • I like a novel about survival in a place where survival is difficult, and I love a novel about how terrible the patriarchy is and how we need to dump it. - Diana A.
    Book, 2025New York : The Dial Press, [2025] — FICTION GOODMAN 2025
  • A gorgeous sweeping historical epic. This book is quite long, but every sentence is worth it. - Alison H.
    Book, 2025New York : G. P. Putnam's Sons, [2025] — FICTION CHEN 2025
  • Completely original historical fiction! This book is well researched and written with a lot of love and respect. - Alison H.
    Book, 2025New York : Gallery Books, 2025. — FICTION BOB 2025
  • A truly beautiful (illustrated!) romance in the face of capitalism, colonialism, and Coney Island. - Leo B.
    Book, 2025New York, NY : Erewhon Books, an imprint of Kensington Publishing Corp., 2025. — SF KELLEY 2025
  • Historical thriller that plays with the notions of time, memory, families and gender. So many BIG thoughts wrapped in a spy story. Ann K.
    Book, 2025New York : Atria Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, LLC, 2025. — FICTION GELFUSO 2025
  • I loved the smart, irreverent female character at the center of this book and the way the author used language. It's excellent as an audiobook, too! - Diana A.
    Book, 2025New York, NY : Harper, 2025. — FICTION TIFFANY 2025
  • For those of us who've spent too much time pursuing goals blindly without asking ourselves "why" - Leo B.
    Book, 2025New York, NY : Harper Voyager, [2025] — SF KUANG 2025
  • Bloody & Mysterious; A slow-building haunting in a telescope of a story - Leo B.
    Book, 2025New York, New York : Saga Press, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, LLC, 2025. — FICTION JONES 2025
  • A funny coming of age story that touches on reproductive rights, the Black queer community, and the importance of community care. - Jasmyne G.-C.
    Book, 2025New York, NY : Random House, an imprint and division of Penguin Random House LLC, [2025] — FICTION MCKENZIE 2025
  • Dark romantasy for the Roman Empire girlies. A thrilling emotional rollercoaster with a smart, powerful female main character. - Willa M.
    Book, 2025New York, NY : A Bramble Book, published by Tom Doherty Associates/Tor Publishing Group, 2025. — SF CROSS 2025
  • Do the early 2000s count as historical fiction? I was deep in my elder millennial feelings over the to detail given to era's indie music scene along with the strong characterization of Percy and Joe. - Kady F.
    Book, 2025New York : Crown, [2025] — FICTION BRICKLEY 2025
  • A captivating take on Oliver Twist from the perspective of Fagin, this story goes deeper into how he became the scoundrel who takes in orphans to do his bidding! - Lori M.
    Book, 2025New York : Doubleday, [2025] — FICTION EPSTEIN 2025