We aim to have the book for each meetup selected at least two months ahead so that everyone has plenty of time to get hold of it and read it. All members get the chance to help select the book from a shortlist of five by voting in an online poll.
Just to clarify: the "London" in the group name relates to where the group is based. It doesn't relate specifically to London history. We are reading historical fiction set all over the world!
We ask for a voluntary contribution of £1 if you attend a meetup - just to go towards the cost of hosting the group on Meetup.com, which is actually quite pricey (£55 every six months!!!).
This does not preclude genuine members from sending a message to the organizer if they hear about interesting events that they feel other members would be interested in or books that they would recommend be considered for selection for future meetups.
"Bright Air Black" by David Vann
"The Outcasts of Time" by Ian Mortimer
"The Winter Isles" by Antonia Senior
"Golden Hill" by Francis Spufford
"Eagle in the Snow" by Wallace Breem
"A Whole Life" by Robert Seethaler
"The Soldier, the Gaolor, the Spy and Her Lover” by Simon Parke
"The Underground Railroad” by Colson Whitehead
“London Lies Beneath” by Stella Duffy
“The Essex Serpent” by Sarah Perry
"The Sky's Dark Labyrinth" by Stuart Clark
“The Petticoat Men” by Barbara Ewing
"Cleopatra's Heir" by Gillian Bradshaw
"Succession" by Livi Michael
"Laurus" by Eugene Vodolazkin
"A Burnable Book" by Bruce Holsinger
"The Last King of Lydia" by Tim Leach
"A Place Called Winter" by Patrick Gale
"A Dead Man in Deptford" by Anthony Burgess
"The Moor's Account" by Laila Lalami
"Devil" by David Churchill
"She Rises" by Kate Worsley
"The White Castle" by Orhan Pamuk
"Lust for Life" by Irving Stone
"The Maid" by Kimberly Cutter
"Some Luck" by Jane Smiley
"Gideon's Angel" by Clifford Beal
"The Lie" by Helen Dunmore
"The Devil in the Marshalsea" by Antonia Hodgson
"A Name in Blood" by Matt Rees
"The Summer Queen" by Elizabeth Chadwick
"After Flodden" by Rosemary Goring
"Augustus" by John Williams
"Burial Rites" by Hannah Kent
"Shadow on the Crown" by Patricia Bracewell
"City of Women" by David Gillham
"The Last Caesar" by Henry Venmore-Rowland
"The Garden of Evening Mists" by Tan Twan Eng
"Death and the Devil" by Frank Schaetzing
"The English Monster" by Lloyd Shepherd
"Jezebel" by Eleanor de Jong
"The Winter Palace" by Eva Stachniak
"The Bone Thief" by V. M. Whitworth
"The King's Diamond" by Will Whitaker
"Theodora" by Stella Duffy
"A Bloody Field by Shrewsbury" by Edith Pargeter
"The Song of Achilles" by Madeline Miller
"The Ground is Burning" by Samuel Black
"Half of the Human Race" by Anthony Quinn
"Pure" by Andrew Miller
"The Paris Wife" by Paula McLain
"A Moveable Feast" by Ernest Hemingway
"Memoirs of Hadrian" by Marguerite Yourcenar
"The Golden Mean" by Annabel Lyon
"Silent in the Grave" by Deanna Raybourn
"Helena" by Evelyn Waugh
"The Leopard" by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
"The Confessions of Catherine de Medici" by CW Gortner
"The Siege" by Helen Dunmore
"As Meat Loves Salt" by Maria McCann
"Spartacus" by Lewis Grassic Gibbon
"The Heretic's Daughter" by Kathleen Kent
"Azincourt" by Bernard Cornwell
"The Fraud" by Barbara Ewing
"Wolf Hall" by Hilary Mantel
"The Great Stink" by Clare Clark
"The Founding" by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles
"Affinity" by Sarah Waters
"Empress Orchid" by Anchee Min
"The Last Queen" by CW Gortner
"The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: or the Murder at Road Hill House" by Kate Summerscale
"The Floating Book" by Michelle Lovric
"I, Claudius" by Robert Graves
"The Last English King" by Julian Rathbone
"The Lost Diary of Don Juan" by Douglas Carlton Abrams.
New members are welcome at any time. There is no commitment to come more often than you wish, though we have many regulars. All we ask is that you keep your attendance status up to date. If you say you're coming to a meetup but then find you can't, please change your status to No as soon as you know. (You can always change it back again!)
Feel free to simply join up here and you'll get all the updates. If you have any particular questions, please just drop the organizer, Claire, a message.
