Great reads that bring the past to life! A list of historical fiction titles for children of all ages.
A Place to Hang the Moon
In World War II England, three orphaned siblings seek a permanent, loving home when they are evacuated to the countryside during the Blitz.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View A Place to Hang the MoonOrange for the Sunsets
Set in 1972 Uganda, amidst the rapid expulsion of people of Indian descent from the country, this story is told in alternating voices of two 12-year-old friends- Asha, of Indian descent, and Yasufo, of African descent.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View Orange for the SunsetsCatherine's War
As France falls to the Nazi regime, Rachel Cohen, a young Jewish girl and a budding photographer, is forced to leave school, change her name, go into hiding, and try to live through the atrocities of World War II.
Format: Graphic Novel
Availability: Available
View Catherine's WarThe Blackbird Girls
Classmates Valentina and Oksaka have a frought rivalry, until the fateful day that the nuclear power plant where both of their fathers work, Chernobyl, explodes. Now their very survival depends on each other as they race to flee the Chernobyl fallout.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View The Blackbird GirlsBeing Clem
It’s 1944, and Clem’s father is serving as a sailor in WWII, when he’s killed in the Port Chicago explosion in San Francisco. Now Clem and his family must struggle even harder to get by in the midst of rampant racial injustice, and Clem must come to terms with his ongoing quest to live up to his father’s legacy.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View Being ClemThe Journey of Little Charlie
When twelve-year old Charlie's sharecropper father dies leaving the family in debt, he is forced to join the fearsome plantation overseer, Cap'n Buck, as he tracks down some people accused of stealing. But Little Charlie soon discovers that the story is more complicated than he thought.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View The Journey of Little CharlieAll He Knew
Spanning 1939-1945, this story told in free verse follows the plight of six-year old Henry, who becomes deaf after a fever and is institutionalized in a home for the feebleminded, where he becomes friends with a conscientious objector to World War II.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View All He KnewGround Zero
In this dual narrative survival story, 9-year-old Brandon is visiting his dad at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001; 18 years later, 11-year-old Reshmina is a girl who has grown up in a remote village in Afghanistan during the aftermath of 9/11. Both must face harrowing odds to survive.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View Ground ZeroThe Night Diary
Told in letters to her dead mother as her family flees after the 1947 partition of India, 12-year old Nisha, who is half Muslim and half Hindu, struggles to understand her own identity and find lasting safety.
Format: Book
Availability: Available
View The Night DiaryWhen Stars Are Scattered
This graphic novel is based on coauthor Omar Mohamed's experience with his brother Hassan, in a Kenyan refugee camp after they fled Somalia. Omar is responsible for his largely nonverbal brother in the camp, but has some important choices to make when the opportunity comes along to get an education.
Format: Graphic Novel
Availability: Available
View When Stars Are Scattered