Historical Literature For Teens

Based on the true life story of Anne Burras, First Lady of Jamestown shares the excitement, sorrow, and grit of 17th Century Jamestown. When tragedy strikes, young Anne is left as the lone woman among hundreds of men in the fledgling Virginia colony, forced to forge a new life for herself despite the confines of her culture and gender. From heartache to love, and from tragic loss to heroic survival in the harshest of conditions, Anne's determination and fortitude through her life's challenges inspires all who learn of her story.

Fifteen-year-old Pip and seventeen-year-old Sissy aren't just sisters, they're best friends. Every year, they wait eagerly for the traveling carnival to put its stakes down in their tiny Florida town. It's the only time when the girls can abandon their endless chores on the family's orange grove and give in to pure joy. And the only time Pip and Sissy can forget their many troubles . . . living on the brink of poverty, Mama's despair, and Daddy's perpetual anger. With the arrival of the carnival, the girls’ slow, small lives suddenly feels bigger and brighter.

Life is progressing normally for sixteen-year-old Dan Renfrew when he accidentally transports himself to England in the year 1066. He soon realizes that he’s trapped there, and that’s not his only astonishing discovery. Dan learns that he’s descended from a long line of time jumpers—secret heroes who travel to the past and resolve glitches in the time stream that threaten to alter subsequent history. The only way Dan can return home is to set history back on its proper course in the Anglo-Saxon age. This is no easy task.

Russia is on the brink of great change. Pasha's coronation approaches, and Vika is now the Imperial Enchanter, but the role she once coveted may be more difficult - and dangerous - than she ever expected. Pasha is grappling with his own problems - his legitimacy is in doubt, the girl he loves loathes him, and he believes his best friend is dead.

The Watch of the Golden Dragon Turtle explores the depths of humanity. The tale spans both time and place. Staged on three separate continents, listeners are thrown on a whirlwind journey 242 years from creation to resolution.

After the deadly trick of the Wooden Horse and the destruction of Troy, the hero Aeneas sets sail with a small number of refugees to find a new homeland. Among those travelling with him are Nisus and Euryalus. Only boys when they flee their burning city, they are teens by the time they reach their destination. During their seven-year quest the two have trained to be warriors, and formed an unbreakable bond. Now, united by a desire to prove their bravery, the two friends decide to go on a daring night raid through a sleeping camp of hostile warriors.

Anastasia Romanov and her younger brother Alexei escape their family’s execution when a bullet strikes Anastasia’s garnet necklace, transporting them to a parallel universe. This alternate Russia is a second chance. Anastasia wants to save her family, Alexei wants the throne, and they plan to travel the infinite multiverse to find a world in which both are possible.

Pete de Lange must survive as a teenager in a small Natal town during the 1980s, together with his new-found friends, Sarita and Petrus. In a country marked by turmoil and racial conflict, this is not as easy as it seems. Pete and his friends witnessed a horrendous crime, and the perpetrator is on their case. Will justice prevail? In between all of this, Pete must try to make the first rugby team and win the heart of his high-school crush, Renate.

When the revolution came, everything changed. The old rulers were overthrown and the city’s traditions were shattered. Annie and Lee grew up in the aftermath, their lives shaped by the chaos. Brought together in the same orphanage and despite their differences, they became each other’s closest ally. But years of training have turned their friendship into rivalry as they now compete to lead the city’s legendary dragonriders.

On a damp night in 1722, Babylou Mac and her three siblings witness the murder of their mother at the hands of the preacher's son—so Babylou kills him. With plantation dogs on their heels, the siblings breach the treacherous confines of the Great Dismal Swamp. Deeper and deeper into Dismal they delve, toward a refuge where they can live freely within the swamp's natural—and supernatural—protection. Three-hundred years later, college student Atlas comes home to North Carolina for the annual Bornday cookout and hog roast.

Sixteen-year-old princess Piper Parish is a disappointment to the citizens of Capalon, a STEM-structured kingdom where innovation is valued above all. Her older sister, the queen, views Piper's tears during their parents' funeral as a weakness, not to mention her strange affinity for singing. When Piper receives an anonymous note stating her mother is still alive and living in the enemy kingdom of Mondaria, Piper chooses to risk death and flees Capalon to prove, once and for all, that she's not just the queen's defective little sister.

Haunted by the sacrifices he made in Constantinople, Radu is called back to the new capital. Mehmed is building an empire, becoming the sultan his people need. But Mehmed has a secret: as emperor, he is more powerful than ever...and desperately lonely. Does this mean Radu can finally have more with Mehmed...and would he even want it? Lada's rule of absolute justice has created a Wallachia free of crime. But, determined to send a message of defiance, she has the bodies of Mehmed's peace envoy delivered to him, leaving Radu and Mehmed with no choice.

When Roberto sneaks off to see a movie in his Italian village, he has no idea that life as he knows it is over. German soldiers raid the theater, round up the boys in the audience, and pack them onto a train. After a terrifying journey, Roberto and his best friend Samuele find themselves in a brutal work camp, where food is scarce and horror is everywhere. The boys vow to stay together no matter what. But Samuele has a dangerous secret, which, if discovered, could get them both killed. Lovers of historical fiction will be captivated by this tragic, triumphant, and deeply moving novel.

In order to save her sister, Zuretta takes a job at an infamous house of horrors—but she might never escape. Zuretta never thought she'd encounter a monster. She had resigned herself to a quiet life in Utah. But when her younger sister, Ruby, travels to Chicago during the World's Fair, and disappears, Zuretta leaves home to find her. But 1890s Chicago is more dangerous and chaotic than she imagined. She doesn't know where to start until she learns of her sister's last place of employment . . . a mysterious hotel known as The Castle.

Gelya is a Vessel, a girl who channels the word of the One True God through song. Cloistered with the other Vessels of her faith, she believes - as all Ovinists do - that a saint imprisoned Elath the Great Demon centuries ago, saving humanity from temptation. When Gelya stumbles into a deadly cover-up by the Ovinists’ military, she reluctantly teams up with Tavik, an enemy soldier, to survive. Tavik believes that Elath is actually a mother goddess who must be set free, but while he succeeds in opening her prison, he inadvertently turns Gelya into Elath’s unwilling human vessel.

A young lad awakens on an island, alone and brutally injured, with no memory of his past. Captain Declan Ross searched for riches that will free him and his headstrong daughter, Anne, from the piracy business forever. Bartholomew Thorne, an infamously ruthless pirate, seeks to destroy Ross and any who stand in his way of the legendary treasure hidden by a mysterious order of monks.

Fresh from her English boarding school, vivacious and carefree Louise Bellingham returns to Paris, only to find it gripped by the iron fist of Nazi rule. As her loved ones are increasingly ensnared in perilous acts of resistance, Louise is yanked from her world of youthful whims into one of dark secrets and perilous duty. But then she meets Hans—a dashing but ruthless Nazi officer whose allure challenges her allegiance to her family and her ethical grounding. A precarious dance of love and war unfolds as Louise battles her internal conflict.

Ari Helix may have won her battle against the tyrannical Mercer corporation, but the larger war has just begun. Ari and her cursed wizard Merlin must travel back in time to the unenlightened Middle Ages and steal the King Arthur's Grail - the very definition of "impossible". It's imperative that the time travelers not skew the timeline and alter the course of history. Coming face to face with the original Arthurian legend could produce a ripple effect that changes everything. Somehow Merlin forgot that the past can be even more dangerous than the future...

It's been a decade since Kate and Cecelia foiled Napoleon's plot to reclaim the French crown. The cousins now have estates, children, and a place at the height of wizarding society. It is 1828, and though magic remains at the heart of the British Empire, a new power has begun to make itself felt across England: the steam engine. As iron tracks crisscross the countryside, the shaking of the locomotives begins to disrupt the workings of English magic, threatening the very foundations of the Empire.

Set against the backdrop of the Revolutionary War, this engrossing tale unveils the untold, yet true-to-life story of a remarkable Irish-American tailor-turned-spy, Hercules Mulligan. Follow Mulligan's clandestine journey as he navigates the treacherous landscape of espionage, employing his wit, charm, and skillful craftsmanship to extract invaluable secrets from his unsuspecting British Officer clients.