Homegoing
Yaa Gyasi
Linked stories follow two half-sisters’ lineages across centuries of African and American history.
Early modern · Victorian / Gilded Age · Family saga · Literary
Early modern · Family saga · ~1500–1789
Early modern family saga historical fiction books
Looking for historical fiction in the family saga lane set during the Early modern (~1500–1789)? Early modern family saga historical fiction books collects historical novels that match both filters—Tudors, exploration, Reformation, revolutions brewing. Multi-generational stories across decades or centuries HisFic is a free historical fiction discovery app: open a full reading journey with the same era and story-type filters, then add region, themes, or audience. Shelves mix curated historical fiction picks with Open Library titles so even thin combinations still have books to explore.
Shelf · 6 titles
Curated HisFic picks first, plus Open Library fills for this era + story type.
Ross Poldark
Winston Graham
In October 1783 Ross Poldark comes back from the American war to Nampara in Cornwall and finds his father dead, the land derelict, and Elizabeth Chynoweth promised to his cousin Francis. Winston Graham’s 1945 novel is early-modern saga historical fiction of the years through 1787—a mine he fights to reopen, the bankers and gentry of Truro, and Demelza Carne, the miner’s daughter he takes in from a fair, who is his wife by the end of this first volume.
Early modern · Family saga · Romance
Aztec
Gary Jennings
In 1529 Bishop Juan de Zumárraga has the elderly Mexica Mixtli—born on the island of Xaltocan in 1466—dictate his life for King Carlos: a stonemason’s son who becomes a scribe, a trader, a warrior, and a councilor to Moctezuma, then watches Hernán Cortés bring down the Triple Alliance. Gary Jennings’s 1980 novel is adventure historical fiction of the Aztec world from a fifteenth-century childhood to the fall of Tenochtitlan, told by a man the bishop will prosecute for heresy once the chronicle is finished.
Medieval · Early modern · Adventure & epic · Family saga
The Other Boleyn Girl
Philippa Gregory
Mary Boleyn’s perspective on the rise of Anne Boleyn and the dangerous theater of Henry VIII’s court.
Early modern · Biographical · Romance
A Tale of Two Cities
Charles Dickens
After eighteen years in the Bastille, Dr Manette is restored to his daughter Lucie in London—then the French Revolution draws an exiled aristocrat, a wasted English lawyer, and the Manettes back to Paris and the shadow of the Guillotine. Dickens’s novel is historical fiction of 1775–1793 London and Paris: sacrifice, revenge, and the best and worst of times.
Regency / Napoleonic · Early modern · Family saga · Literary
The Mountains Sing
Phan Quế Mai Nguyễn
English literature · Fiction, sagas · Fiction, historical · Vietnam war, 1961-1975, fiction
Cold War · Late 20th century · Military & war · Open Library
Other story types in Early modern
Looking for a broader list? See Early modern historical fiction or family saga historical fiction.