Whether you’re participating in our Decades Reading Challenge or found this post searching for books set in the 1940s, the booklist below provides a wide variety of reading options.
Our curated list of books about the Forties includes historical fiction books about life in America and around the world. We also included some non-fiction reads about the events and people of the day.
World War II largely consumed the news of the early and mid-1940s. There are some heart-breaking, but important, books from this period in world history. Outside of the war, historic events such as the polio epidemic and the partition of India were taking place. But don’t worry – our 1940s booklist also includes a variety of other topics, including some that have a lighter feel!
WW2 brought many technological advancements, including nuclear fusion and the starting points for both commercial air travel and space exploration. After the war, the 1940s saw the beginning of the Baby Boomer generation.
For additional historical context, check out the timeline of major world events included at the end of the post.
For many actors and actresses, winning an Oscar is the pinnacle of success that sets them up for an even better future. But for Hattie McDaniel, her best supporting actress win after playing the role of Mammy in the controversial movie Gone With the Wind was life-changing in a different way.
After winning, Hattie was trapped between two worlds, neither of which appreciated her. White Hollywood saw her only as her character, Mammy. The Black community, led by the NAACP, detested the demeaning portrayal of their community and waged war against her.
Through it all, Hattie struggled but also continued her fight to pave a path for other Negro actors, focused on war efforts, fought housing discrimination, and navigated four failed marriages. Along the way, she was supported by a core group of friends including Clark Gable, Louise Beavers, Ruby Berkley Goodwin, and Dorothy Dandridge.
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Hattie McDaniel was the first Black person to win an Oscar, yet her name is underrecognized today. We’re excited to learn more about her life and resilience through this historical fiction novel.
Independence takes you into the lives of three sisters during a traumatic period of history – partition, in which India became only for Hindus and a carved-out area became Pakistan, which was assigned to Muslims. It was one of the largest human displacements in history.
Sister Priya is intelligent and determined to follow in her father’s footsteps to become a doctor, even though that isn’t a normal path for a woman. Deepa is considered the beautiful one, and dreams of a marriage that will increase her family’s status AND bring her joy. Jamini is a talented quiltmaker with deep passions she doesn’t reveal to her family.
When Deepa falls in love with a Muslim and partition is declared, the sisters are separated and propelled onto different paths. They fear for themselves, but also for what could happen to each other.
Bess is the college-educated daughter of poor Russian Jewish immigrants living in the Bronx. In 1945, she competed in the Miss America pageant, bringing traumatized Jews an opportunity to root for one of their own in Atlantic City’s Warner Theatre. She hoped to win the $5000 scholarship in order to further her education.
This is a fictionalized look at the early years of the real Bess Myerson, who became the first (and only) Jewish Miss America. Bess was nearly six feet tall and gorgeous, but in her world, success was measured by intellectual attainment. In this precarious post-war period, she searched for love and acceptance as she tried to make her mark on the world.
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This book provides a glimpse into both pageant life and the struggles of the Jewish community in 1940s America. Many did not want a Jewish woman to represent America, but Bess wasn’t focused only on her own barriers. She noticed that there were no Black contestants and this motivated her to win and push for changes.
This story of friendship introduces us to three young women in 1943 New York. Although their struggles are different than those who had the war on their doorstep in Europe & around the world, they were each impacted in different ways.
Margaret works at the Navy Yard by day but at night, she knits socks for soldiers. When she sticks a note inside a pair of socks, she ends up with an unexpected pen pal.
Gladys is a feminist before the rise of feminism, but when she meets someone who respects her, she wonders if she can have it all.
Dottie’s fiance has been deployed to fight. However, she became pregnant before he shipped out. She’s terrified her parents will make her give up the baby if she tells them, so her friends are even more important than ever.
This novel transports you to 1940s rural Colorado and the home of teenager Victoria Nash. Despite her young age, she runs the household as the sole female in a family of troubled men. One day, she meets Wilson Moon, a mysterious young drifter who has been displaced from his tribal land. Their sudden and passionate connection is full of danger and secrets.
Victoria ends up fleeing to the harsh mountain wilderness in a small hut, where she struggles against impossible conditions. As the Gunnison River rises and threatens her homeland, she begins a quest to fight for all she has lost.
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This is a great pick if you enjoy deep and descriptive, character-driven reads. While much of the book is slower-paced, the final chapters are said to be the best.
Inspired by the author’s own family history, this novel is a tragic love story. Alina and Tomasz were best friends who planned to marry. But when their village falls to the Nazis, Alina doesn’t know if Tomasz is alive or dead.
Decades later, Alice is struggling to support her son, who was born with an autism spectrum disorder. When her grandmother is hospitalized, she begs Alice to return to Poland to see what became of those she loved. Alice travels to Poland and begins to uncover her grandmother’s story.
The Book Girls Say…
We both really enjoyed this unique look into WW2. It’s not a light read, but it’s a great look at what generations before us endured on a personal level. The split storyline between current times and the war is a nice reprieve from the harder 1940s scenes.
When her family loses their wealth after her father falls ill, June joins the steno pool at a popular advertising firm in Montreal. Her parents would have preferred her to find a husband and start a family like her sister, Daisy, but June has a hard time imagining herself in that role.
As June thrives in the advertising world thanks to her flair for writing, she discovers a hidden layer to her sister’s life. In fact, it seems that secrets and lies are in abundance within her family. Can she keep everything together while still fighting to reconcile the expectations of her family and society with her own dreams?
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This novel is based on the true story of the author’s aunt, a talented writer who dared to break the expectations of young women in the 1940s.
Henry Lee’s father desperately wants his son to be an American. But, at his school, he is ignored by all of the white kids. The one friend he makes is a young Japanese girl named Keiko. Soon, Keiko and her family are rounded up into a Japanese internment camp. Forty years later, Henry finds himself searching to reconnect.
In addition to giving readers a closer look at the Japanese internment camps in America that often get glossed over in our history lessons, this book also peeks into the 1940s Seattle jazz scene.
The Book Girls Say…
Melissa really enjoyed learning about a part of WWII that she knew very little about. This one will make you think, but it’s NOT a graphic look into the horrors of war.
The Accidental President: Harry S. Truman and the Four Months That Changed The World
A.J. Baime
Publication Date:
11/07/2017
Setting:
1945, Washington D.C. & beyond
Book Girls’ Readers Rate This Book
92% Would Recommend to a Friend
Book Summary
No one expected obscure Missouri politician Harry Truman to become a US president. He was selected as Franklin Roosevelt’s vice president because of his good judgment and lack of enemies, and luckily, he was also known for his good work ethic. In 1945, Truman became the 33rd president when Roosevelt suddenly died in office, amidst a world at war.
This well-researched biography covers Truman’s first 120 days in office, in which he faced constant challenges. In those four months alone, he was heavily involved in the founding of the United Nations, the Potsdam Conference, the Manhattan Project, the Nazi surrender, the liberation of concentration camps, and the decision to drop the bomb and end World War II.
While many English children were sent from London to the English countryside as part of Operation Pied Piper, others went to Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. This novel takes us into the lives of a young widowed mother and a young teacher, who bravely volunteers to help protect children amidst a war.
Until 1940, Alice only experienced adventure and bravery through characters in books. But when a plane crashes near her home, she finds new motivation and strength to join the war effort. As a schoolteacher, she’s the perfect volunteer to help accompany children overseas.
Lily has a talent for math, and once dreamed of using that for more than calculating her grocery budget. But then she found love, and had two adored children. Her world is ripped apart by war, and as bombs reign down, she must decide how to keep her children safe.
The Book Girls Say…
The Last Life Boat is a well-researched look into the torpedoing of The City of Benares in September 1940. One reviewer calls it “terribly sad yet uplifting in its own way,” so be prepared for an emotional read if you pick this one!
Fresh from their sorority house at the University of Iowa, Marjorie and her best friend Marty arrive in New York City hoping for summer jobs as shopgirls. After being turned away from numerous department stores, they find jobs at Tiffany & Co., becoming the first women to work on the sales floor and making them the envy of all of their friends.
Telling of the magical summer that the author spent in NYC with her best friend, Hart’s short memoir allows us to see snippets of history through their eyes. As she reflects back on it many decades later, she recalls it as the best summer of her life, spent rubbing elbows with the rich and famous.
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This is a must-read for all fans of vintage New York glamour.
In this non-fiction book that reads like fiction, we are introduced to Louis Zamperini in his childhood. He’s considered a bit of a delinquent before channeling his angst into running. And he was great. His talent for running took him all the way to the Berlin Olympics in 1936. But when the second World War begins, Louis goes from athlete to airman.
In May 1943, Louis’ bomber crashed into the Pacific Ocean. His unlikely survival aboard a tiny raft surrounded by sharks, and on the verge of starvation, lands him in an even more perilous trial as he is driven to the limits of endurance and ingenuity.
The Book Girls Say…
Prior to this book, most of Angela’s knowledge of WWII centered around the wrongs of the Third Reich and the devastating impacts of the atomic bomb dropped on Japan. But outside of Pearl Harbor, she didn’t know much about Japan’s role in the war. Before reading this book, she also didn’t think she had much interest in WWII non-fiction – Unbroken changed all that!
If you’re a Gilmore Girls fan, you may have noticed the name of the audiobook narrator sounded familiar. Edward Herrmann is the actor who played Richard Gilmore, Lorelai’s tough, yet endearing father.
Beatrice dreamed of enjoying an escapist year teaching English, but now she is stranded in war-ravaged Italy. Francesca and Edoardo let her stay in their beautiful walled garden, Villa delle Colombe, which has an elaborate cypress maze in the center.
Francesca has also invited other children and adults to shelter on the estate with its mysterious maze. As the war gets closer, the residents witness unthinkable things.
In 2015, Beatrice is now the custodian of the estate and welcomes Tess, who is seeking healing after the loss of her husband. Tess finds solace in the gardens until Marco, the estate’s absent owner, arrives. He’s ready to sell to developers. Is it finally time for Beatrice to reveal the villa’s painful past?
Ginny’s family migrated to California from Oklahoma during the Dust Bowl, and now they work as peach pickers. She’s only 7, the same age as Peggy, whose parents own the farm. Ginny & Peggy become close friends, despite the differences in their financial situations.
Ten years later, the girls are now teenagers when Ginny’s family returns to the farm. There have been hard times in between, and the differences between them are now more palpable. Peggy’s new best friend is Lisette, the banker’s daughter. All three girls have one unfortunate aspect of life in common – their families are on the verge of falling apart.
Ginny has a plan, but she needs the other girls to help her make it happen. Can they build a better future for themselves in a changing world?
The Book Girls Say…
This YA historical fiction is said to be beautifully written, but keep in mind that the story unfolds slowly. The author explores not only family dynamics but digs into the culture at the beginning of the post-war boom era.
Bletchley Park is a real English estate and was an elegant country home before becoming the secret location of WW2 codebreakers. The Rose Code imagines the life of three women from different backgrounds who all qualified for this challenging and vital task. While the three become friends, the war and secrecy required for their jobs prove too much to keep them close.
Seven years later, in 1947, the wedding of Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip is on everyone’s minds. But, when an encrypted letter is received, the former friends must reunite to crack the code and figure out which former Bletchley Park worker is now a traitor.
The Book Girls Say…
This book is long at 624 pages, but our readers say it’s engaging throughout! If you enjoyed The Alice Network or The Huntress, you know Kate Quinn’s books are worth the extra time.
Set in a small Cajun community, a young black man – Jefferson – is in the wrong place at the wrong time when a liquor store shooting leaves three men dead. As the only survivor, he is convicted of murder and sentenced to death.
Grant Wiggins left his hometown to attend university but returned to teach at the plantation school. His aunt persuades him to visit Jefferson in jail to share some of his learning so that Jefferson can “die a man.”
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When it was published in 1993, the Chicago Tribune called this book “an instant classic”. It was also a National Book Critics Circle Choice winner.
Lilac Girls crosses three continents and follows three women whose lives are on a collision course.
Caroline is a New York socialite working at the French consulate, Kasia is a Polish teenager and a courier for the underground resistance movement, and Herta is an ambitious young German doctor who finds herself trapped in a male-dominated world of Nazi secrets and power.
The book alternates between the three stories, each providing thought-provoking insights into uniquely difficult situations as the war progressed.
The Book Girls Say…
Melissa loved Lilac Girls, although it includes tragic scenes that are tough to read. She was devastated when she learned that this historical fiction was based on the true experiences of the ‘Ravensbrück Rabbits.’
Get your tissues ready; this story is part of history that we shouldn’t ignore.
The Gown takes us inside the workrooms of the famed fashion house of Norman Harnell, where one of the most famous wedding gowns in history was created for Princess Elizabeth. Here we meet Ann and Miriam, two embroidered.
Seventy years later, Heather seeks to unravel the mystery of a set of embroidered flowers left behind by her late grandmother, who never spoke of her life in Britain.
The Book Girls Say…
This is the first book Melissa read that focused on the years right AFTER the war. While making the gown is important to the story and fascinating, it’s not what you’ll remember. The story is much broader, and we think you’ll love this step back into the post-war years.
HEADS UP: There is a sexual assault scene in the book that some readers may find difficult.
As London is emerging from WWII, Juliet Ashton, a writer, is looking for the subject of her next book. She begins exchanging letters with a man she’s never met – a native of the island of Guernsey. Through their letters, Juliet is drawn into the world of the man and his eccentric friends. Though they range from pig farmers to phrenologists, they are all literature lovers.
As Juliet learns about their tastes in books, she also comes to understand the impact that the German occupation has had on their lives.
The Book Girls Say…
This is a great choice for those who love epistolary novels, which are told through written correspondence between the characters.
Geography Note: Located between the UK and France, the Channel Islands, including Guernsey, are not part of the UK or the EU, but are dependent territories of the British Crown.
Told from the perspective of an older woman looking back on her youth, City of Girls is a fictional life story set in the New York theater world during the 1940s.
Nineteen-year-old Vivian has been kicked out of Vassar College due to poor performance, and her affluent parents send her to live with her aunt, who owns a flamboyant but crumbling midtown theater.
Other charismatic theater employees, from showgirls to Olive, the no-nonsense secretary that keeps everyone in line, have their own spaces on the 3rd and 4th floors. Vivian loves fashion and is a talented seamstress, which is perfect for making clothes for the Lily dancers on and off the stage.
The main setting of the book is 1940s New York City, spanning the years before the US entered WW2, along with the war years. Vivian reflects on the events of those years, including a personal mistake that almost ruined the course of her life in a moment.
Many years later, at the age of 95, she tells her story, musing that “at some point in a woman’s life, she just gets tired of being ashamed all the time.”
The Book Girls Say…
We loved this book so much that we curated an entire list of books with similar themes. Some have very obvious connections – others on the list may surprise you!
The author spent ten years creating this book, and the final result is a beautifully written story of a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.
Marie-Laure was twelve when the Nazis occupied Paris. She was forced to flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo with her father. Along with the other things they could carry, they have what might be the most valuable and dangerous jewel from the Museum of Natural History, where her father worked.
Werner is a German orphan and spends his time becoming an expert at repairing radios. His knowledge makes him a prime recruit for those hoping to track down resistance workers.
The Book Girls Say…
All the Light We Cannot See won the Pulitzer Prize and was a National Book Award finalist, both well-deserved as he captures the effects of war on two children with vivid details. Fans of literary fiction will be drawn to the writing in this one.
Set in 1943 Copenhagen, Number the Stars is the story of 10-year-old Annemarie and her best friend, Ellen. While they’re attending school every day like normal, the country faces food shortages, and Nazi soldiers are all around town. As Hilter’s regime gains power, the Jewish citizens of Denmark, including Ellen’s family, are “relocated.” Annemarie’s family agrees to keep Ellen in their home, at significant risk to her and themselves.
The Book Girls Say…
If you’re looking for a short book to kick off the year, this is your winner at only 137 pages. While it’s technically a middle-grade book, it’s been enjoyed by readers of all ages since its original publication in 1989 and attention as the Newbery Medal winner in 1990. If you read this one in the 90s, especially if you were a child or young adult at the time, it’s worth a re-read now.
In the 1940s, polio became a feared pandemic across the world. The disease was cruel – killing or paralyzing those contracting it, with children particularly impacted. This historical fiction tells the story of a real scientist, Dorothy Horstmann, who worked desperately for a cure.
While many male scientists raced to beat each other to a polio vaccine so they could achieve notoriety, Dorothy’s eye remained on the goal of saving lives. Her name was commonly left off of the scientific discoveries she made in favor of her male co-workers, but she still forged diligently ahead.
The Book Girls Say…
This book provides an interesting look at a real-life female scientist whose work overlapped the 1950s timeline of Elizabeth Zott’s fictional chemistry career.
Twenty-three-year-old nurse Tess is engaged to the love of her life; however she finds out she is pregnant, and he is not the father. While staying with him would make her happy, she doesn’t want to trap him in a lie. So instead, she marries the baby’s father, Henry, and moves to small Hickory, North Carolina.
Henry isn’t the best to Tess, and neither are the neighbors in her new home. When a polio outbreak begins and the town builds a polio hospital, Tess knows this is her opportunity to get back to work and create a life outside her unhappy home. However, Henry isn’t happy about her revitalized career, and his mysterious actions escalate.
The Book Girls Say…
While this is a fictional drama, it also provides insight into another defining feature of the 40s that you may not have read about as much – the explosive growth of polio cases in the mid to late 1940s.
This is the remarkable true story of Lt. Col. Harry Stewart Jr., one of the last surviving Tuskegee Airmen pilots who experienced air combat during World War II.
Soaring to Glory recounts the bravery and heroics of Stewart’s combat missions, as well as the cruel injustices that Stewart and his fellow Tuskegee Airmen faced during their wartime service and when they returned home after the war.
The Book Girls Say…
This memoir is a quick read at under 300 pages, but it tells such an important and often overlooked story of WWII.
Ten-year-old Sarah is arrested with her family in the Vel’ d’Hiv’ round up – the most notorious act of French collaboration with the Nazis. But before the police come to take them, Sarah locks her younger brother in their favorite hiding spot – a cupboard in the family’s apartment and holds onto the key, thinking she’ll be back soon.
On the 60th anniversary of the Vel’ d’Hiv’, an American journalist is asked by her Paris-based magazine to write an article about that day in France’s past. Having lived in Paris for 25 years, she realizes her ignorance about the event and is shocked by the silence that still surrounds it. She begins to follow a trail that connects her to Sarah and forces her to question everything.
The Book Girls Say…
Keep the tissues handy because this book will bring you to tears.
You are welcome to choose any book that you’d like to read for the challenge, but we hope that this list of books has given you a good starting point.
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We compiled this list of major events of the 1940s to provide some historical context for your reading. We hope you enjoy learning a bit more about this period in history.
Aggression in World War II, which officially began in 1939, continued. Germany expanded their aggression into Denmark, Norway, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands. Germany also began “The Blitz,” bombing London in an attempt to weaken the British Royal Air Force.
During 1940, Franklin D. Roosevelt won an unprecedented third term as the U.S. president. The same year, President Roosevelt instituted the first military draft in the United States during peacetime.
In the early 1940s, the Tuskegee Institute was at the forefront of preparing young African-American pilots to fight for freedom in the skies.
During 1941, Soviet Russia and Japan signed a non-aggression pact, becoming allies with Germany. The Siege of Leningrad began as German troops entered the Soviet Union and lasted until 1944.
On December 7, 1941, Japan launched a surprise attack on the U.S. naval base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. This act of war finally brought the United States to the front lines. Italy and Germany also declared war on the U.S.
The Battle of Midway between Japan and the U.S. began in 1942. Fearing they would become a security threat during wartime, the US government began the internment of Japanese-Americans.
The same year, the U.S. Congress created several branches of the armed forces for women to join the war effort.
On June 6, 1944, famously known as D-Day, more than 150,000 Allied troops successfully stormed the beaches of Normandy in France. Shortly thereafter, the Allies liberated Paris.
FDR began his fourth term as President of the United States. However, he unexpectedly died in April of 1945, moving VP Harry Truman to the Oval Office.
1945 brought the end of WWII, as Allied and Soviet forces liberated concentration camps on their way toward Germany.
In August 1945, the U.S. dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, ending the war in the Pacific Theatre. In the aftermath of the war, fifty nations signed the charter to create the United Nations.
In 1945, Vietnam declared its independence from France under Ho Chi Minh.
During 1947, India became independent from the United Kingdom. The same year, the country instituted the tragic policy of partition. Leaders carved out Pakistan for Muslim citizens, with Hindu citizens assigned to reside in India.
In 1947, Jackie Robinson joined the Brooklyn Dodgers, becoming the first African-American to play Major League Baseball in the modern era. Robinson and other black athletes during the 1940s, including boxer Joe Louis and Olympian Jesse Owens. These athletes became popular heroes and paved the way for future generations.
In 1948, Indian independence leader and pacifist Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated on his way to a prayer meeting, after achieving independence for India.
Following the continued growth of Jewish refugees and settlers to Israel during WWII, Israel was created as an independent Jewish state in 1948.
Following the Chinese Civil War, Mao Zedong’s Communist forces declared the founding of the People’s Republic of China on October 1, 1949.
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