Regency / Napoleonic · Family saga · ~1789–1837
Looking for historical fiction in the family saga lane set during the Regency / Napoleonic (~1789–1837)? Regency / Napoleonic family saga historical fiction books collects historical novels that match both filters—Balls, war, empire, Austen-adjacent and beyond. 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.
Curated HisFic picks first, plus Open Library fills for this era + story type.
Leo Tolstoy
Five Russian families move through court, love, and the Napoleonic invasion as 1805 becomes Borodino and Moscow burns. Tolstoy’s epic is Napoleonic historical fiction on a national scale—ballrooms and battlefields, Pierre and Natasha, and the question of who makes history.
Regency / Napoleonic · Family saga · Literary
Victor Hugo
In 1815, convict Jean Valjean is released from the galleys and tries to live honestly under a stolen name, while Inspector Javert hunts him through Restoration and July-Monarchy France. Hugo’s novel follows Fantine, Cosette, Marius, and the 1832 Paris barricades—crime, mercy, and a social epic that still defines French historical fiction after Waterloo.
Regency / Napoleonic · Family saga · Literary
Kathleen Grissom
In the spring of 1791, seven-year-old Lavinia, an Irish orphan who cannot remember the voyage that killed her parents, is indentured to the kitchen house at Tall Oaks, Captain James Pyke’s tobacco plantation in Tidewater Virginia. Kathleen Grissom’s 2010 novel is Regency saga historical fiction of the years she is raised by Belle and the kitchen family, then drawn up into the big house, where the captain is away and the mistress is lost to opium.
Regency / Napoleonic · Family saga
Andrea Levy
A Jamaican woman narrates slavery’s last years and emancipation with wit and steel (Walter Scott Prize 2011).
Regency / Napoleonic · Victorian / Gilded Age · Literary · Family saga
George Eliot
In a Midlands town on the eve of the 1832 Reform Act, idealistic Dorothea Brooke marries the dry scholar Casaubon, while ambitious doctor Tertius Lydgate is drawn to beautiful, expensive Rosamond Vincy—two marriages, and a whole province of clergy, bankers, and gossips, testing what a life is for. George Eliot’s novel is Reform-era historical fiction of vocation, money, and the unhistoric acts that shape an English town.
Regency / Napoleonic · Literary · Family saga
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
William Makepeace Thackeray
Becky Sharp leaves finishing school with nothing but wit and climbs Regency England beside gentle Amelia Sedley—through London drawing rooms, a disastrous marriage, and the chaos of Waterloo. Thackeray’s novel without a hero is Napoleonic-era historical fiction of class, hypocrisy, and a social war fought as fiercely as the one on the Belgian field.
Regency / Napoleonic · Family saga · Literary
John Steinbeck
Fiction · Family · Good and evil · migrant labor
Victorian / Gilded Age · Late 20th century · Literary · Open Library
John Jakes
Fiction · Historical Fiction · Large type books · Fiction, historical, general
Victorian / Gilded Age · Literary · Open Library
David H. Richter
Fiction · 20th century English fiction · British and irish fiction (fictional works by one author) · christian fiction
Victorian / Gilded Age · Late 20th century · Adventure & epic · Literary · Open Library
John Steinbeck
Fiction · Social life and customs · World War, 1939-1945 · literary fiction
Victorian / Gilded Age · Late 20th century · Military & war · Literary · Open Library
Valerie Martin
Mistresses · Plantation owners' spouses · Slavery · Women slaves
Victorian / Gilded Age · Literary · Open Library
Tracy Grant
Fiction · Historical Fiction · Kidnapping · Missing children
Regency / Napoleonic · Romance · Mystery · Open Library
William Faulkner
African Americans · American fiction · Fathers and sons · Fiction
Civil War · Victorian / Gilded Age · Military & war · Open Library
John Steinbeck
Labor Trilogy · psychological fiction · Male friendship · Goal (Psychology)
Victorian / Gilded Age · Late 20th century · Literary · Open Library
Julian Fellowes
Family secrets · History · Social life and customs · Large type books
Victorian / Gilded Age · Literary · Open Library
Jane Austen
English fiction · Women authors · Literary collections · Women
Victorian / Gilded Age · Romance · Literary · Open Library
Patrick Quentin
Literature · Collections · migrant labor · historical fiction
Victorian / Gilded Age · Late 20th century · Literary · Open Library
Looking for a broader list? See Regency / Napoleonic historical fiction or family saga historical fiction.