Books like 'Conquered City'
Readers who enjoyed Conquered City by Victor Serge also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
historical 20th century military, war & conflict politics historical-fiction war literary-fiction communism urban law-enforcement
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The Girl from Berlin by Kate Hewitt
Rated: 4.44 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThey sat together on the roof, watching Berlin burn, as traces of smoke and cloud floated through the air. “I just want to be free,” Rosa said quietly, “Even if only for a few minutes. It might be the last chance I have.”Berlin, 1936: From her beautiful new home a young woman named Liesel Scholz barely notices the changes to the city around her...Categorized as:
urban historical-fiction war politics literary-fiction europe western-central-europe germany -
The Spoon Stealer by Lesley Crewe
Rated: 4.39 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsBorn into a basket of clean sheets—ruining a perfectly good load of laundry—Emmeline never quite fit in on her family's rural Nova Scotian farm. After suffering multiple losses in the First World War, her family became so heavy with grief, toxicity, and mental illness that Emmeline felt their weight smothering her. And so, she fled across the Atlantic and built her life in England... -
Standing at the Scratch Line: King Tremain Series, Book 1 by Guy Johnson, Dion Graham
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsRaised in the steamy bayous of New Orleans in the early 1900s, LeRoi "King" Tremain, caught up in his family's ongoing feud with the rival DuMont family, learns to fight. But when the teenage King mistakenly kills two white deputies during a botched raid on the DuMonts, the Tremains' fear of reprisal forces King to flee Louisiana...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century action-adventure adult -
On a Wing and a Prayer by Helen Carey
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 10 ratings‘This dramatic and poignant novel depicts the resilience of ordinary people caught up in an extraordinary war.Unputdownable!’ Western Telegraph Life is hard in London in 1941, and yet Helen de Burrel finds herself volunteering to join the SOE. Nobody knows that her cool exterior conceals such courage ... and such fear. It also means that love, when it strikes unexpectedly, is doubly dangerous... -
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The Forgotten Bookshop in Paris by Daisy Wood
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFrom an exciting new voice in WWII historical fiction—and the author of The Clockmaker’s Wife—comes a tale of love and a betrayal that echoes through generations…Paris, 1940: War is closing in on the city of love. With his wife forced into hiding, Jacques must stand by and watch as the Nazis take away everything he holds dear... -
The Smallest Crack by Roberta Kagan
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratings1933 Berlin, GermanyWhen the price for life is dishonor dipped in blood, how much is too much?Eli Kaetzel and his beautiful but timid wife Rebecca suddenly find themselves in the gaping maws of Adolf Hitler's murderous rampage. Eli knows that their only chance, however slim, for survival may lie in the hands of Gretchen, a spirited Aryan girl...Categorized as:
urban historical-fiction war literary-fiction europe western-central-europe germany ww2 -
Freedom or Death by Nikos Kazantzakis
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFreedom or Death by Nikos Kazantzakis is a novel on the heroic or epic scale about the rebellion of the Greek Christians against the Turks on the island of Crete, where Kazantzakis was from... -
The First Circle by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsNotice: "In the First Circle" and "The First Circle": "In The First Circle" is 200pp longer; "The first circle" is a censored and abridged version.Set in Moscow during a three-day period in December 1949, 'The First Circle' is the story of the prisoner Gleb Nerzhin, a brilliant mathematician...Categorized as:
communism historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century action-adventure adult -
The Centurions by Jean Lartéguy
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThis is Jean Larteguy's most famous book that garnered international acclaim and sold millions of copies. It was also the basis for the movie, The Lost Command, starring Anthony Quinn. In his autobiography, Larteguy writes that he got the name of the book from when he was traveling with the Foreign Legion in the Sahara and came across an old Roman column at an oasis...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century action-adventure adult book -
They Were Counted by Miklós Bánffy, Patrick Leigh Fermor
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsPainting an unrivalled portrait of the vanished world of pre-1914 Hungary, this story is told through the eyes of two young Transylvanian cousins, Count Balint Abady and Count Laszlo Gyeroffy...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century action-adventure adult book -
Stalingrad by Vasily Grossman
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsVasily Grossman’s Life and Fate has been hailed as a twentieth-century War and Peace. However, Life and Fate is only the second half of a two-part work, the first half of which was published in 1952. Grossman wanted to call this earlier work Stalingrad—as it will be in this first English translation—but it was published as For a Just Cause...Categorized as:
communism historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century adult audiobook -
The Wife Who Risked Everything by Ellie Midwood
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsBerlin, 1943: “Where’s your husband?” the SS man demanded.“There’s no one home,” Margot said before they started tearing the place apart. “I’m alone here.” In his eyes was nothing but ice and death, and it occurred to Margot that only she stood between her husband and the soldier’s machine gun.In Nazi Germany, Margot refuses to buckle under the weight of Hitler’s tyranny... -
Bosnian Chronicle by Ivo Andrić, Joseph Hitrec
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsSet in the town of Travnik, Bosnian Chronicle presents the struggle for supremacy in a region that stubbornly refuses to submit to any outsider. The era is Napoleanic and the novel, both in its historical scope and psychological subtley, Tolstoyan. In its portray of conflict and fierce ethnic loyalties, the story is also eerily relevant...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century action-adventure adult book -
1921: The Great Novel of the Irish Civil War by Morgan Llywelyn
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe Irish fight for independence is one of the most captivating tales of the twentieth century. Morgan Llywelyn, the acclaimed historical writer of books like Lion of Ireland, Bard and The Horse Goddess , is the writer born to bring this epic battle to life...Categorized as:
historical-fiction war politics literary-fiction fiction historical 20th-century audiobook -
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The Collected Stories of Isaac Babel by Isaac Babel
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFollowing the historic publication of Norton's The Complete Works of Isaac Babel in the fall of 2001, The Collected Stories of Isaac Babel appears as the most authoritative and complete edition of his fiction ever published in paperback...Categorized as:
historical-fiction humor literary-fiction war 20th-century adult anthologies classics -
Children Of The Arbat by Anatoli Rybakov
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsSet in 1934, Children of the Arbat presents a masterful and chilling psychological portrait of Stalin and details the beginning of his reign of terror and its impact on a generation - represented by a circle of young friends living in Moscow's intellectual and artistic center, the Arbat...Categorized as:
communism historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century audiobook book -
The Last Train to London by Meg Waite Clayton
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsThe New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Exiles conjures her best novel yet, a pre-World War II-era story with the emotional resonance of Orphan Train and All the Light We Cannot See, centering on the Kindertransports that carried thousands of children out of Nazi-occupied Europe—and one brave woman who helped them escape to safety... -
A Prophet Without Honor: A Novel of Alternative History by Joseph Wurtenbaugh
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratings‘A Prophet Without Honor’ is that rare novel that provides a rich, entertaining and fully immersive reading experience, along with a resonant, thought-provoking subtext. Written in epistolary style and populated with interesting, fully-realized characters, the multi-general narrative is a seamless blend of authentic fact and sound speculation...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century adult alternate-history book -
Down Lambeth Way by Mary Jane Staples
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsThe beginning of a wonderful saga telling the story of a Cockney family in peace and war from multi-million copy seller Mary Jane Staples. Perfect for fans of Kitty Neale, Maggie Ford and Katie Flynn... -
Into the Burning Dawn: Heartbreaking and gripping World War 2 historical fiction set in Italy by Natalie Meg Evans
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsIn the terrace courtyard of the palazzo overlooking a sparkling bay, the scent of ripening lemons filled the air. His deep brown eyes gazed into hers with determination and longing. ‘Will you do it? Risk everything and join us?’Twenty-one-year-old Imogen Fitzgerald was raised in an English orphanage and never knew her parents... -
One Left: A Novel by Kim Soom, Bonnie Oh
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsDuring the Pacific War, more than 200,000 Korean girls were forced into sexual servitude for Japanese soldiers. They lived in horrific conditions in "comfort stations" across Japanese-occupied territories. Barely 10 percent survived to return to Korea, where they lived as social outcasts...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction war fiction historical tragedy ww2 violent-conflict -
Sapphire Skies by Belinda Alexandra
Rated: 4.14 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA love bigger than a war. A beautiful woman lost. A mystery unsolved … until now. 2000: The wreckage of a downed WWII fighter plane is discovered in the forests near Russia’s Ukrainian border. The aircraft belonged to Natalya Azarova, ace pilot and pin-up girl for Soviet propaganda, but the question of her fate remains unanswered... -
Eureka Street by Robert McLiam Wilson
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsAs two pals wander the streets of Belfast in search of something better--a better pint, a better job, a better woman, a better now--readers are treated to their hilarious misadventures, political intrigues, and outlandish schemes...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction war 20th-century action-adventure adult -
Dark Star by Alan Furst
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe acclaimed author of Night Soldiers offers a dramatic and exciting spy thriller of Eastern Europe on the brink of World War II. In the back alleys and glittering salons of Europe, there is a thin line between survival and betrayal, as Soviet NKVD agents and the Nazi Gestapo confront each other in a brilliant duel of espionage. Like watching Casablanca for the first time.--Time... -
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Burr by Gore Vidal
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsGore Vidal's Narratives of Empire series spans the history of the United States from the Revolution to the post-World War II years. With their broad canvas and large cast of fictional and historical characters, the novels in this series present a panorama of the American political and imperial experience as interpreted by one of its most worldly, knowing, and ironic observers... -
Ports of Call by Amin Maalouf, Alberto Manguel
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsA graceful story of love across an insuperable gulf and a powerful allegory for the conflict that has beset the Middle East for the last half century. To call your son Ossyane is like calling him Rebellion. For Ossyane’s father it is a gesture of protest by an excited Ottoman prince, for Ossyane himself it is a burdensome responsibility... -
The Phantom Patrol by James R. Benn
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsIn the nineteenth installment of James R. Benn’s acclaimed WWII mystery series, an investigation into a secret gang of Nazi-affiliated art thieves in post-Liberation Paris leads Billy Boyle and his comrades into the catastrophic Battle of the Bulge in winter 1944... -
My Lvov: Holocaust Memoir of a twelve-year-old Girl by Janina Hescheles, Yaroslav Hrytsak
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsWhile still twelve years old, Janina Hescheles wrote this harrowing report from her hiding place in Cracow. The notebook, filled with clear childlike writing, was fortunately preserved. She tells about the German occupation of Lvov, the loss of her parents, about the Ghetto and mass murder in the notorious forced-labor camp Janowska in Lvov...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction war 20th-century adult book coming-of-age fiction -
The Way Back to Florence by Glenn Haybittle
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsIn 1937 Freddie (English), Isabella (Italian) and Oskar (a German Jew) become friends at an art school in Florence where they are taught by the dictatorial but magus-like Maestro and his sinister fascist assistant Fosco. When war arrives Freddie returns to England to become the pilot of a Lancaster bomber...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction war 20th-century 21st-century adult book fiction -
Enemies of the Heart by Rebecca Dean
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 6 ratingsBerlin 1909 - cousins Vicky and Zelda are about to meet the Remer brothers... Vicky Hudson is only seventeen when she marries Berthold Remer and moves from her idyllic Yorkshire home to Berlin. Adjusting to her new life isn't easy, not least when she discovers that the Remer family are producing weaponry for the German army... -
The Emperor's General (4 Cassettes) by James Webb, David Dukes
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 8 ratings1997. Jay Marsh, Wall Street millionaire and grand old man of the diplomatic corps, takes a sentimental journey to the scene of his first triumphs and agonies, Manila, where as a brash young captain during World War II he served as aide-de-camp and confidant to General Douglas MacArthur. Marsh sees beyond the glittery capital of today to the horrifying days of 1945... -
The Valley of Bones by Anthony Powell
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsWith their lives drastically remodeled by World War II, the characters of The Dance to the Music of Time series continue their colorful exploits. Nicholas Jenkins, the narrarator, now in his thirties, is second-lieutenant in an infrantry regiment and life in the army is examined at startingly close range... -
The Case of Comrade Tulayev by Victor Serge
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsOne cold Moscow night, Comrade Tulayev, a high government official, is shot dead in the street, and the search for his killer begins. In this panoramic vision of the Soviet Great Terror, the investigation leads all over the world, netting a whole series of suspects whose only connection is their innocence—at least of the crime of which they stand accused...Categorized as:
communism crime historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century action-adventure -
The Voyage: A Historical Novel set during the Holocaust, Inspired by real events by Roberta Kagan
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsOn May 13th 1939, five strangers boarded the MS St. Louis, Promised a future of safety away from Nazi Germany and Hitler’s third Reich unbeknownst to them they were about to embark upon a voyage built on secrets, lies, and treachery. Sacrifice, love, life, and death hung in the balance as each fought against fate but the voyage was just the beginning... -
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The Investigation by Jung-Myung Lee
Rated: 4.08 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsWatanbe Yuichi, a young guard with a passion for reading, is ordered to investigate a murder. The victim, Sugiyama, also a guard, was feared and despised throughout the prison and inquiries have barely begun when a powerful inmate confesses... -
The Light We Left Behind by Tessa Harris
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsEngland: 1944When psychologist Maddie Gresham is sent a mysterious message telling her to report to Trent Park mansion, she wonders how she will be helping the war effort from a stately home. She soon finds captured Nazi generals are being detained at the house. Bugged with listening devices in every room, it’s up to Maddie to gain the Nazis’ trust and coax them into giving up information...Categorized as:
historical-fiction war literary-fiction law-enforcement romance ww2 fiction historical -
The New Confessions by William Boyd
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn this extraordinary novel, William Boyd presents the autobiography of John James Todd, whose uncanny and exhilarating life as one of the most unappreciated geniuses of the twentieth century is equal parts Laurence Stern, Charles Dickens, Robertson Davies, and Saul Bellow, and a hundred percent William Boyd. From his birth in 1899, Todd was doomed... -
The Beginning and the End by Naguib Mahfouz
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsFirst published in 1956, this is a powerful portrayal of a middle-class Egyptian family confronted by material, moral, and spiritual problems during World War II...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction war 20th-century adult anthologies classics fiction -
Once Night Falls by Roland Merullo
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA harrowing historical novel of the extraordinary acts of ordinary people in Nazi-occupied Italy. Italy, 1943. Luca Benedetto has joined the partisans in their fight against the German troops ravaging the shores of his town on Lake Como. While risking his life to free his country, Luca is also struggling to protect Sarah, his Jewish lover who’s hiding in a mountain cabin... -
The One I Was by Eliza Graham
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsRestless, troubled Rosamond Hunter has spent most of her life running away from the past, filled with guilt about her involuntary role in her mother’s death. When her nursing job brings her back to Fairfleet, her childhood home, to care for an elderly refugee, she is forced to confront the ghosts that have haunted her for so long... -
I'm Staying Here by Marco Balzano
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsCuròn, 1920.In a small village in South Tyrol, Trina longs for a different life. She dedicates herself to becoming a teacher, but the year that she qualifies Mussolini's regime abolishes the use of German as a teaching language.In this new climate of fear and uncertainty Trina works for a clandestine network of schools in the valley, always with the risk of capture.Curòn, 1939... -
Soul by Andrei Platonov, Robert Chandler
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 23 ratingsA New York Review Books OriginalThe Soviet writer Andrey Platonov saw much of his work suppressed or censored in his lifetime. In recent decades, however, these lost works have reemerged, and the eerie poetry and poignant humanity of Platonov’s vision have become ever more clear... -
HHhH by Laurent Binet
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsHHhH: "Himmlers Hirn heisst Heydrich", or "Himmler's brain is called Heydrich". The most dangerous man in Hitler's cabinet, Reinhard Heydrich was known as the "Butcher of Prague." He was feared by all and loathed by most...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction humor literary-fiction politics war 20th-century 21st-century -
The Berlin Stories by Christopher Isherwood
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFirst published in 1935 and 1939, the two related novels, The Last of Mr. Norris and Goodbye to Berlin, which make up The Berlin Stories are recognized today as classics of modern fiction...Categorized as:
historical-fiction literary-fiction politics urban war 20th-century adult anthologies -
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Striding Folly by Dorothy L. Sayers, Janet Hitchman
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThree of Lord Peter Wimsey's most baffling cases demonstrate his unique detction skills at their most spectacular.The engima of a house numbered thirteen in a street of even numbers; an indignant child accused of theft, a dream about a game of chess that uncovers the true story behind a violent death...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction humor law-enforcement literary-fiction war 20th-century adult -
Red Cavalry by Isaac Babel
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsOne of the great masterpieces of Russian literature, the Red Cavalry cycle retains today the shocking freshness that made Babel's reputation when the stories were first published in the 1920s...Categorized as:
communism historical-fiction literary-fiction politics war 20th-century adult anthologies -
Not Quite Dead Enough by Rex Stout
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe army wants Nero Wolfe urgently, but he refuses their clarion call to duty. It takes Archie Goodwin to titillate Wolfe’s taste for crime with two malevolent morsels: a corpse that refuses to rest in peace and a sinister “accident” involving national security...Categorized as:
crime historical-fiction humor law-enforcement politics war 20th-century action-adventure -
The Nazi and the Barber by Edgar Hilsenrath
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 15 ratingsBerlin was still a heap of ruins. ... One day they would rebuild the city again. I could see the day coming. And the rest of Germany, too. Yes. They would rebuild everything again. All Germany. And then ... yes ... perhaps they will bring back the Fuhrer from heaven... -
Under the Frog by Tibor Fischer
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsShortlisted for the Booker Prize, Under the Frog follows the adventures of two young Hungarian basketball players through the turbulent years between the end of World War II and the anti-Soviet uprising of 1956...Categorized as:
communism historical-fiction humor literary-fiction politics war 20th-century action-adventure -
The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin by Vladimir Voinovich, Владимир Войнович
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsIvan Chonkin is a simple, bumbling peasant who has been drafted into the Red Army. Shortly before the outbreak of World War II, he is sent to an obscure village with one week's ration of canned meat and orders to guard a downed plane. Apparently forgotten by his unit, Chonkin resumes his life as a peasant and passes the war tending the village postmistress's garden...Categorized as:
communism historical-fiction humor literary-fiction politics war 20th-century action-adventure
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