Best World War II Fiction: Novels of the War in Europe and the Pacific
Novels set in the Second World War: life under occupation, battle fronts, the home front and the years just after. Every book here is in the Tori catalog, and each line says why it fits.
Occupied Europe and the Holocaust
2015The NightingaleKristin Hannah
Historical Fiction · EpicTwo sisters in occupied France resist the war in very different ways.
2006Sarah's KeyTatiana de RosnayHistorical Fiction · MelancholicA journalist in Paris uncovers the story of a girl caught in the 1942 roundup.
2016Lilac GirlsMartha Hall KellyHistorical Fiction · DarkThree women's lives cross during and after the war, inspired by real events.
2018The Tattooist of AuschwitzHeather MorrisHistorical Fiction · DarkA prisoner tattooing numbers at Auschwitz meets a young woman, in a novel inspired by a true story.
2005The Book ThiefMarkus ZusakHistorical Fiction · MelancholicA girl in Nazi Germany steals books, narrated by Death.
2004Suite FrançaiseIrène NémirovskyHistorical Fiction · MelancholicIrène Némirovsky's unfinished novel of France in the first year of the war.
2010The Invisible BridgeJulie OrringerHistorical Fiction · EpicA Hungarian student goes to Paris in 1937 and is caught up in the coming war.
2014All the Light We Cannot SeeAnthony DoerrHistorical Fiction · HopefulA blind girl in Paris and a German radio-gifted orphan, on opposite sides of World War II.
1982Schindler's ArkThomas KeneallyHistorical Fiction · DarkA German factory owner saves over a thousand Jewish workers from the death camps.
1996Fugitive PiecesAnne Michaels
Literary Fiction · MelancholicA seven-year-old survives a raid on his family's home in Poland and is found by a Greek geologist.
1979Sophie's ChoiceWilliam StyronLiterary Fiction · DarkA young writer in a Brooklyn boarding house befriends a Polish survivor of Auschwitz and her volatile lover.
War at the front
1971The Winds of WarHerman WoukHistorical Fiction · EpicHerman Wouk follows a US Navy officer and his family as war spreads.
1948The Naked and the DeadNorman Mailer
Classics · TenseAn American reconnaissance platoon fights on a fictional South Pacific island during World War II.
1951From Here to EternityJames JonesHistorical Fiction · TenseAt Schofield Barracks in Hawaii, a career soldier who refuses to box is harassed daily by his superiors.
1961Catch-22Joseph HellerClassics · DarkCaptain Yossarian, a bombardier in 1942-44, checks into a military hospital to avoid flying more missions.
1969Slaughterhouse-FiveKurt VonnegutClassics · DarkBilly Pilgrim, an optometrist from Ilium, New York, lives his life out of order, from Dresden to Tralfamadore.
1951The Caine MutinyHerman WoukHistorical Fiction · TenseA young ensign, an unstable captain and a court-martial.
- Tales of the South Pacific1947Tales of the South PacificJames A. MichenerHistorical Fiction · Warm
Nineteen linked stories of American servicemen on Pacific islands.
2013The Narrow Road to the Deep NorthRichard FlanaganHistorical Fiction · DarkAn Australian surgeon on the Thai-Burma railway looks back on captivity and a lost love.
1994Captain Corelli’s MandolinLouis de BernièresHistorical Fiction · WarmAn Italian officer and a Greek doctor’s daughter during the occupation.
1944A Bell for AdanoJohn HerseyHistorical Fiction · WarmAn American officer rebuilds a Sicilian town in 1943.
The home front, spies and the aftermath
2012Code Name VerityElizabeth Wein
Young Adult · TenseA captured British agent writes her confession in occupied France.
2016Everyone Brave Is ForgivenChris CleaveHistorical Fiction · WarmYoung Londoners find love and courage at the start of the war.
2013Life After LifeKate AtkinsonLiterary Fiction · ThoughtfulUrsula Todd lives, dies and begins again, through two world wars.
2001AtonementIan McEwanLiterary Fiction · MelancholicA child’s lie changes lives, and she spends decades trying to make amends.
2019The HuntressKate QuinnHistorical Fiction · TenseA war correspondent, a Nazi hunter and a teenager chase a war criminal after the war.
2004Small IslandAndrea LevyHistorical Fiction · WarmJamaican migrants Hortense and Gilbert find lodgings in the London home of an English couple in 1948.
1992The English PatientMichael OndaatjeHistorical Fiction · MelancholicFour people shelter in a ruined Italian villa at the end of the Second World War.
1984Empire of the SunJ. G. BallardHistorical Fiction · DarkA boy in Shanghai is cut off from his parents when Japan takes the city.