Books like 'Captains and the Kings'
Readers who enjoyed Captains and the Kings by Taylor Caldwell also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
historical romance 20th century historical-fiction classics drama family epic politics corruption
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The Secrets of the Tea Garden by Janet MacLeod Trotter
Rated: 4.56 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsShe’s gone in search of happy memories. But was her idyllic childhood in India an illusion? After the Second World War, Libby Robson leaves chilly England for India, and the childhood home where she left her heart—and her beloved father, James—fourteen years ago. At first Libby is intoxicated by India’s vibrant beauty: the bustle of Calcutta, the lush tea gardens of Assam... -
O Continente - Volume I by Erico Verissimo
Rated: 4.57 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA vast sprawling period novel of the minor wars that wracked Brazil from the days when its European masters gambled with their colonists' affairs to the Civil Wars which turned family against family and set Republicans and Federalists at each others throats. Backgrounded by these wars, the story follows the history of the Terra-Cambaras, during 150 years, in the southern part of Brazil. The men . -
Arch of Triumph by Erich Maria Remarque
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsIt is 1939. Despite a law banning him from performing surgery, Ravic – a German doctor and refugee living in Paris – has been treating some of the city’s most elite citizens for two years on the behalf of two less-than-skillful French physicians... -
The Velvet Ribbon by Nadine Dorries
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn this wonderful third Tarabeg novel, Mary Kate Malone finds that a secret life in the shadows with her great love, Dr Nicholas, brings heartache and sorrows. When disaster strikes unexpectedly, she turns to the only people she can trust, in the only place she feels safe – her Irish family and friends in the west coast village of Tarabeg. But back in Ireland, everything has changed... -
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This Earth of Mankind by Pramoedya Ananta Toer
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsMinke is a young Javanese student of great intelligence and ambition. Living equally among the colonists and colonized of 19th-century Java, he battles against the confines of colonial strictures. It is his love for Annelies that enables him to find the strength to embrace his world...Categorized as:
classics drama epic family historical-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure -
A Man by Oriana Fallaci
Rated: 4.39 of 5 stars · 18 ratings"What's the point anyway — Of suffering, dying? It teaches us to live, boy. A man who does not struggle does not live, he survives." (quote from the book)The book is a pseudo-biography about Alexandros Panagoulis written in the form of a novel. Fallaci had an intense romantic relationship with Panagoulis... -
Threepenny Dreams by Anna Jacobs
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsRecently widowed, Hannah Firth is still young - young enough to dream of a new life. When her spiteful daughter-in-law uses her as an unpaid servant, Hannah tries to leave, but she is unaware of the depths that Patty's spite will lead her to... -
Falls the Shadow by Sharon Kay Penman
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 34 ratingsThis is Simon de Montfort's story—and the story of King Henry III, as weak and changeable as Montfort was brash and unbending. It is a saga of two opposing wills that would later clash in a storm of violence and betrayal, a story straight from the pages of history that brings the world of the thirteenth century completely, provocatively, and magnificently alive... -
The Queen of Beauty by Petra Durst-Benning, Edwin Miles
Rated: 4.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsPetra Durst-Benning’s captivating historical novel pays homage to the trailblazing women of the early twentieth century—like Elizabeth Arden and Estée Lauder—who shaped culture, shattered convention, and strived to make the world around them more beautiful... -
The Children Of Lovely Lane by Nadine Dorries
Rated: 4.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe second book in the Lovely Lane series from Nadine Dorries. Lily hates the sound of children playing - the ceaseless shouting and laughter and kicking of balls to and fro in the street outside the rough Liverpool tenement where she lives... -
The Nightingale Sisters by Donna Douglas
Rated: 4.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsTo the student nurses at The Nightingale hospital, the ward sisters are heartless and frightening, with impossibly high standards. But the sisters have troubles of their own...VioletThe new night sister is not all that she seems. Who is she and what dark secret is she hiding? As the mystery deepens, Sister Wren is determined to find out the truth... -
Child of All Nations by Pramoedya Ananta Toer
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIn Child of All Nations, the reader is immediately swept up by a story that is profoundly feminist, devastatingly anticolonialist—and full of heartbreak, suspense, love, and fury. Pramoedya immerses the reader in a world that is astonishing in its vividness: the cultural whirlpool that was the Dutch East Indies of the 1890s...Categorized as:
classics drama family historical-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure adult -
Footsteps by Pramoedya Ananta Toer
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsAs the world moves into the twentieth century, Minke, one of the few European-educated Javanese, optimistically starts a new life in a new town: Betawi. With his enrollment in medical school and the opportunity to meet new people, there is every reason to believe that he can leave behind the tragedies of the past...Categorized as:
classics drama epic family historical-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure -
The Angry Tide by Winston Graham
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe Angry Tide is the seventh novel in Winston Graham's classic Poldark saga, the major TV series from Masterpiece on PBS.Cornwall, towards the end of the 18th century. Ross Poldark sits for the borough of Truro as Member of Parliament - his time divided between London and Cornwall, his heart divided about his wife, Demelza...Categorized as:
classics drama epic family historical-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure -
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High Street by Anna Jacobs
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsIn 1845 Annie Gibson can finally leave Salem Street. Her dreams of being able to open an elegant dressmaking salon in the High Street of Bilsden, a Lancashire mill town, have come true. And she is going to take her father and his second family with her, away from poverty, away from the Rows. But Annie has not left trouble behind. Someone is trying to undermine her business... -
A Daughter's Journey: Birch End Series Book 1 by Anna Jacobs
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsJo Melling has arrived in Birch End from Australia, still grieving her father's recent death. She's not intending to stay long, but after tracking down her distant family, Jo becomes more involved in village life than she could ever have imagined - and suddenly in danger too.Jo also finds herself drawn to Nick, a handsome newcomer to the village... -
The Orphans of Ardwick by Emma Hornby
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsAfter a cold, hard winter on the streets, three orphan children are about to give up hope when an unexpected turn of events brings them to the doorstep of a grand house in Ardwick, Manchester. Taken in by the firm but kind-hearted cook, the young friends can hardly believe their luck... -
Warleggan by Winston Graham
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsWhen Ross and Elizabeth's old attraction rekindles itself, Demelza retaliates by becoming dangerously involved with a Scots cavalry officer. With bankruptcy an increasing possibility, the Poldarks seem to be facing disaster on all fronts...Categorized as:
classics drama epic family historical-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure -
Far From Home by Lyn Andrews
Rated: 4.36 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAs daughter of the blacksmith in her tiny Irish village, sixteen-year-old Kitty Doyle knows little of the ways of the world, but she has to grow up fast when her widowed father re-marries and she has no choice but to leave the family home.Luckily there's work to be found over the water in 1920s Liverpool and soon Kitty has a job in a grocer's, where she also catches the eye of the owner... -
The Girls of Mulberry Lane by Rosie Clarke
Rated: 4.36 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsLove, marriage, birth, death and betrayal make up life in Mulberry Lane, perfect for fans of Nadine Dorries and Cathy Sharp. Maureen Jackson is a prisoner of her father's blackmail. Three years ago, she'd been hoping to marry Rory, the man of her dreams. However after her mother's death Maureen was left to care and work for the overbearing father who claimed he couldn't manage without her... -
House of Glass by Pramoedya Ananta Toer
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsWith House Of Glass comes the final chapter of Pramoedya's epic quartet, set in the Dutch East Indies at the turn of the century. A novel of heroism, passion, and betrayal, it provides a spectacular conclusion to a series hailed as one of the great works of modern literature... -
The Shop Girls of Harpers by Rosie Clarke
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratings1911 – The beginning of a brand new series for No1 bestselling author Rosie Clarke, Welcome to Harpers of Oxford Street. When Sally, Beth, Margaret and Rachel meet at a job interview for the wonderful new store in Oxford Street they have no idea they will become lifelong friends.When all four girls are lucky enough to be selected as sales staff their exciting new adventure begins... -
Something Dangerous by Penny Vincenzi
Rated: 4.28 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe dazzling Lytton twins, Adele and Venetia, are born into the great Lytton publishing empire. In 1928, on their eighteenth birthday, they are rich and admired, with a confidence verging on arrogance. But the spectre of Nazi Germany is growing... Gradually their privileged world darkens in unimaginable ways - but it is not just the twins whose lives have been irrevocably changed... -
Our Polly by Anna Jacobs
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsLittle Billy is the light of Polly's life -- it's for her son's sake that she puts up with an unkind mother-in-law and an isolated farm. Then Billy is knocked down by a car, his father killed attempting to save his life, and Polly, cast off by her husband's family, is left with a child who may never walk or talk again... -
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A Valley Secret by Anna Jacobs
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsThe second book in the brand new Backshaw Moss series from million-copy bestseller Anna JacobsLancashire, 1930s. When her mother dies, leaving her an old sewing box and a clue to her father's identity, 22-year-old Maisie Bassett is determined to make a fresh start.Changing her name and moving to the small town of Rivenshaw, she finds a respectable job in a grocery store... -
The Four Swans by Winston Graham
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsThe sixth book in the legendary Poldark saga. Cornwall, 1795: Although Ross Poldark - now something of a war hero - seems secure in his hard-won prosperity, a new dilemma faces him in the sudden infatuation of a young naval officer for his wife Demelza. All four women - the four swans - whose lives touch Ross' face a crisis in these years...Categorized as:
classics drama epic family historical-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure -
Elm Tree Road by Anna Jacobs
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsAfter being driven from home by their brutal father, the Willitt sisters, Mattie, Nell and Renie, find themselves facing greater heartache in the wider world. Nell has left home to be with her lover, Cliff, fearing what reprisals might come from marrying against her father’s wishes.After parting ways with Mattie the couple take youngest sister Renie and head for Lancashire... -
The Girl on the Doorstep: from the bestselling author of The Workhouse Children (A Black Country Novel) by Lindsey Hutchinson
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsLeft an orphan, five-year-old Rosie Harris is found and raised by Maria, a Romany gypsy. Life on the road is hard, but the little girl soon feels one of the tribe with the travellers. As she grows older, Rosie realises she has 'second sight' and is able to read people's palms and see into their futures... -
Millie by AnneMarie Brear
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsA brand new series from the author of the Kitty McKenzie series and The Slum Angel. The Great War is over, and Millie is ready to leave her loving family home and be a wife to Jeremy who is everything she had hoped for. Until… Not long after their wedding, Millie discovers Jeremy is affected by shell shock and moving into his late father’s cold dark estate escalates the problem... -
Every Mother's Son by Lyn Andrews
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsMolly and Bernie have been friends forever. As young girls they left Ireland seeking new beginnings in Liverpool. Now they are marrying their sweethearts and looking forward to enjoying the lives they've worked so hard to build. But as the Liverpool Blitz begins, it seems as if their dreams are about to be destroyed. Night after night, horrific bombing tears the city apart... -
The Lady's Maid: A Novel by Dilly Court
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsFrom internationally bestselling author Dilly Court comes a breathtaking historical saga about fate, friendship, and family Born on the same night in the summer of 1854, two infants are ripped away from their young mothers. Kate lives the life of a servant, penniless and shackled to her circumstances, while Josie grows up in the lap of luxury, given privilege and freedom she takes for granted... -
Demelza by Winston Graham
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsDemelza, the miner's daughter that Poldark rescued from a fairground rabble, is now his wife. Demelza's efforts to adapt to the ways of the gentry bring her confusion and heartache, despite the joy in the birth of their first child. Additionally the seeds of dispute with Warleggan are sown... -
The Girls from See Saw Lane by Sandy Taylor
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsBrighton 1963. Mary Pickles and I walked along the street with our arms linked, looking in shop windows. We were best friends and together we were invincible.Dottie and Mary forged a friendship over a bag of penny sweets when they were eight years old... -
Gora by Rabindranath Tagore, Marguerite Glotz
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsVast in its scope and rich in thought Gora has been acclaimed as a monumental work in the history of Bengali fiction. The story reflects the social, political and religious scene in Bengal at the turn of the century. The forces that were operating in Bengal at that time were one of the intense nationalism and revival of ancient spiritual values and also that of liberal western thought... -
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The Angels of Lovely Lane by Nadine Dorries
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIt is 1953 and five very different girls are arriving at the nurses' home in Lovely Lane, Liverpool, to start their training at St Angelus Hospital. Dana has escaped from her family farm on the west coast of Ireland. Victoria is running away from a debt-ridden aristocratic background. Beth is an army brat and throws in her lot with bitchy Celia Forsyth... -
A New York Secret by Ella Carey
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFrom top-ten bestseller Ella Carey comes a stunning Second World War novel. The glitter, glamor and danger of 1940s New York collide in this dazzling story about a young woman striving to survive in a world where everything is set against her.War forces her to choose a side…1942, New York... -
The Planter's Bride by Janet MacLeod Trotter
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratings1922: cousins and best friends, Sophie and Tilly, are looking for love and adventure. Sophie, orphaned at six, when her tea planter parents died suddenly of fever in India, has been brought up by a radical aunt in Edinburgh. Tilly meanwhile has lived a sheltered life in Newcastle... -
The Rose Stone by Teresa Crane
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsA dazzling jewel holds the key to a prosperous new life… or total ruin The Rose Stone. A diamond, gained through betrayal and blood, upon which the Rosenberg family's fortunes were founded and whose price is yet to be paid. Kiev, 1875: Josef Rosenberg narrowly escapes death from a Cossack raid, rescuing Tanya, the youngest daughter of his old friend Boris Anatov...Categorized as:
historical-fiction family epic romance historical 20th-century literary-fiction fiction -
A Daughter’s Dream by Cathy Sharp
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsHeartache and hardship in London’s East End, from the bestselling author of The Orphans of Halfpenny StreetAmy Robinson and her fiance Matthew are struggling to resist the temptations faced by a soon-to-be-wed couple. To avoid these, Matthew throws himself into a new job and she goes to work in an exclusive new dress shop, where she meets Mary Maitland...Categorized as:
historical-fiction family epic female-mc psychological romance 20th-century holidays -
Birthright by Patricia Dixon
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsA woman's quest to save her family's chateau in France brings danger, rivalry, and romance--and reveals a secret buried since World War II . . .1931, Chateau de Chevalier: Ophélie, La Duchesse de Bombelle, receives a love letter from her admirer Picasso along with a gift: a priceless painting. Nine years later, the Nazis invade France and steal countless works of art, including Ophélie's gift . -
The Wartime Vet by Ellie Curzon
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsEngland, 1941. Dedicated local vet Laura cares for the farm animals of the little village of Bramble Heath. But falling bombs aren’t the only danger as the war hits close to home…Despite everyone telling her it’s not a suitable career for a woman, Laura has worked hard to become a successful livestock vet... -
The Girl From the Workhouse: A heart-breaking, emotional family saga by Lynn Johnson
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsEven in the darkest of times, she never gave up hope Staffordshire, 1911. Ginnie Jones’s childhood is spent in the shadow of the famous Potteries, living with her mother, father and older sister Mabel. But with Father’s eyesight failing, money is in short supply, and too often the family find their bellies aching with hunger. With no hope in sight, Ginnie is sent to Haddon Workhouse... -
On the Wings of Hope by Ella Zeiss, Helen MacCormac
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsAs World War II draws to a close, can two young people find love, hope—and freedom?February 1942: Terrifying reports of the Wehrmacht’s advance across the Soviet Union spread like wildfire, striking new fear into the already oppressed German families living there.Harri Pfeiffer, now sixteen, is summoned to the forced labour camp in Chelyabinsk... -
Whitsunday Dawn by Annie Seaton
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsWith the pristine beauty of the Whitsundays under threat, can they expose the truth in time? Australian author Annie Seaton brings to life a new area of romance — Eco-Adventure. Perfect for fans of Di Morrissey. When Olivia Sheridan arrives in the Whitsundays as spokesperson for big mining company Sheridan Corp, it should be a straightforward presentation to the town about their proposed project... -
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Symphony of the Dead by Abbas Maroufi, عباس معروفی
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsThis novel traces the fate of the Urkhani family in the Iranian town of Ardabil before & after the Second World War through the trials & ghostly recollections of its very individual members, who include: Ideen, the frustrated poet; Urhan, his greedy & talentless younger brother; & Yousef, whose childhood antics left him paralysed... -
Niccolò Rising by Dorothy Dunnett
Rated: 4.27 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsWith the bravura storytelling and pungent authenticity of detail she brought to her acclaimed Lymond Chronicles, Dorothy Dunnett, grande dame of the historical novel, presents The House of Niccolò series. The time is the 15th century, when intrepid merchants became the new knighthood of Europe...Categorized as:
classics epic family historical-fiction politics 20th-century action-adventure adult -
At the Going Down of the Sun by Elizabeth Darrell
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThis family epic, set during World War I, follows the fortunes of three brothers and the women who loved and waited for them. One, heir to the exquisite family home of Tarant Hall in Dorset, will be driven to the Front by accusations of cowardice... -
In a Kingdom by the Sea: An enchantingly beautiful and heartbreaking historical romance novel by Sara MacDonald
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsA sweeping, evocative story of love, secrets and betrayal, set against the stunning backdrops of Karachi and Cornwall. Perfect for readers who love Santa Montefiore, Rosanna Ley and Dinah Jefferies.When Gabby’s husband accepts a transfer to Pakistan, she discovers a new world of heat and colour, of exotic bazaars and trips to the breath-taking Kashmiri mountains... -
The First Emma by Camille Di Maio
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsCamille Di Maio's fifth novel THE FIRST EMMA is the true story of Emma Koehler, whose tycoon husband Otto was killed in a crime-of-the-century murder by one of his two mistresses—both also named Emma—and her unlikely rise as CEO of a brewing empire during Prohibition. When a chance to tell her story to a young teetotaler arises, a tale unfolds of love, war, beer, and the power of women... -
Katherine Wentworth by D.E. Stevenson
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsA pretty, courageous young widow, faced with the task of bringing up three children and making her way alone in the world, is the appealing heroine of this touching love story executed with D.E. Stevenson's characteristic freshness and charm...
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