Open Books 2024: Books set in the Middle Ages

The Open Books Reading Challenge is a year-long reading challenge for people interested in pushing the boundaries of their reading. For full details of the program, please check-out our page at: https://www.rplmn.org/books-more/discover-more/open-books-reading-challenge

This list is to help you find books that fit the 2024 category of "Books set in the Middle Ages."

Happy Reading!

Updated December 18, 2023
RPL Staff
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Flame in the mist
Ahdieh, Rene?e
Paper Book
The Canterbury tales
Chaucer, Geoffrey
Paper Book
'Nevill Coghill's easy, seductive translation ensures that this, the most popular work in English Literature - now 600 years old - will run through yet more centuries' Melvyn Bragg In The Canterbury Tales Chaucer created one of the great touchstones of English...
Manuscript found in Accra
Coelho, Paulo.
Paper Book
Another incredible novel from the #1 internationally bestselling author of The Alchemist. Centuries before, on the eve of the invasion of Accra, the citizens gathered. A man stood before them and invited the people share their fears that he might offer hope and comfort. His...
1356 : a novel
Cornwell, Bernard
Paper Book
Go with God and Fight Like the Devil. A fascinating hero and the pursuit of a sword with mythical power - this is the remarkable new novel by Britain's master storyteller, which culminates at the Battle of Poitiers in 1356. The Hundred Years War rages on and the bloodiest battles are yet...
The last kingdom : a novel
Cornwell, Bernard.
Paper Book
The first book in a brand new series, The Last Kingdom is set in England during the reign of King Alfred. Uhtred is an English boy, born into the aristocracy of ninth-century Northumbria. Orphaned at ten, he is captured and adopted by a Dane and taught the Viking ways. Yet Uhtred's fate is...
The Beatryce prophecy
DiCamillo, Kate
Paper Book
Pillars of the earth
Follett, Ken.
Paper Book
A spellbinding epic tale of ambition, anarchy, and absolute power set against the sprawling medieval canvas of twelfth-century England, this is Ken Follett's classic historical masterpiece.The Pillars of the Earth tells the story of Philip, prior of Kingsbridge, a devout and resourceful monk driven...
The bride
Garwood, Julie.
Paper Book
From one of the world's most popular and successful romance writers comes this novel of searing love and destiny. Alec is everything Jamie's heart warns against. And though he fires her blood, she brazenly resists him, until one rapturous moment.
The Vatican princess : a novel of Lucrezia Borgia
Gortner, C. W.
Paper Book
Infamy is no accident. It is a poison in our blood. It is the price of being a Borgia. Glamorous and predatory, the Borgias became Italy's most ruthless and powerful family, electrifying and terrorizing their 15th-century Renaissance world. To this day, Lucrezia Borgia, the...
The king's curse
Gregory, Philippa.
Paper Book
From the bestselling author of The Other Boleyn Girl and The White Princess comes the riveting story of Margaret Pole, daughter of George, Duke of Clarence, and was one of the few surviving members of the Plantagenet dynasty after the Wars of the Roses. Plantagenet, once carried proudly by Margaret...
Genghis : lords of the bow
Iggulden, Conn.
Paper Book
The epic, action-packed and powerful second novel in Conn Iggulden's bestselling Conqueror series, bringing to the story of Genghis Khan brilliantly to life The gathering of the tribes of the Mongols has been a long time in coming but finally, triumphantly, Temujin of the Wolves, Genghis...
The buried giant
Ishiguro, Kazuo
Paper Book
There's a journey we must go on, and no more delay . . .
A hero born
Jin, Yong
Paper Book
THE CHINESE "LORD OF THE RINGS" - NOW IN ENGLISH FOR THE FIRST TIME.THE SERIES EVERY CHINESE READER HAS BEEN ENJOYING FOR DECADES - 300 MILLION COPIES SOLD..ONE OF TIME MAGAZINE'S 100 BEST FANTASY NOVELS OF ALL TIME."Jin Yong's work, in the Chinese-speaking world, has...
Powers and thrones : a new history of the Middle Ages
Jones, Dan
Paper Book
The instant Sunday Times bestseller A Times, New Statesman and Spectator Book of the Year 'Simply the best popular history of the Middle Ages there is' Sunday Times 'A great achievement, pulling together many strands...
The time traveler's guide to medieval England : a handbook for visitors to the fourteenth century
Mortimer, Ian
Paper Book
An original, entertaining and illuminating guide to a complete different world: England in the Middle Ages. Imagine you could get into a time machine and travel back to the fourteenth century. What would you see? What would you smell? More to the point, where are you going to stay? Should you go...
The shadow throne
Nielsen, Jennifer A.
Paper Book
Jennifer A. Nielsen takes readers on an extraordinary journey in this final installment of the NEW YORK TIMES bestselling Ascendance Trilogy. War is coming...Join Jaron as he embarks on his final adventure!
She Who Became the Sun
Parker-Chan, Shelley.
Paper Book
The Number One Sunday Times Bestseller An immersive, historical fantasy set in 14th-century China, She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan is a queer tale of love, loss, betrayal and triumph. 'Magnificent in every way' - Samantha Shannon, author of...
Femina : a new history of the Middle Ages, through the women written out of it
Ramirez, Janina
Paper Book
THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER **LONGLISTED FOR THE CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE** 'Janina Ramirez is a born storyteller, and in Femina she is at the peak of her powers. This is bravura narrative history underpinned by passionate advocacy for the women...
The architect's apprentice
Shafak, Elif
Paper Book
'There were six of us- the master, the apprentices and the white elephant. We built everything together . . . ' Sixteenth century Istanbul- a stowaway arrives in the city bearing an extraordinary gift for the sultan. The boy is utterly alone in a foreign land, with no wordly possessions to...

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