
20th Century > 1940s

1942
by Winston Groom
The Year That Tried Men's Souls. On December 6, 1941, an unexpected attack on American territory pulled an unprepared country into a terrifying new brand of warfare. Novelist and popular historian Winston Groom vividly re-creates the story of America's first year in World War II. To the generation of Americans who lived through it, the Second World War was the defining event of the twentieth century, and the defining events of that war were played out in the year 1942.
Year: 2004
Genre: 1940s, World War II

Motherless Brooklyn
by Jonathan Lethem
Brooklyn's very own self-appointed Human Freakshow, Lionel Essrog is an orphan whose Tourettic impulses drive him to bark, count, and rip apart our language in startling and original ways. Lionel's world is suddenly topsy-turvy, and this outcast attempts to untangle the threads of the case while trying to keep the words straight in his head. Motherless Brooklyn is a brilliantly original, captivating homage to the classic detective novel by one of the most acclaimed writers of his generation.
Year: 1999
Genre: 1940s, Conspiracy, Private Eye

Summer of '49
by David Halberstam
With incredible skill, passion, and insight, Pulitzer Prize-winningauthor David Halberstam returns us to a glorious time when the dreams of a now almost forgotten America rested on the crack of a bat.The year was 1949, and a war-weary nation turned from the battlefields to the ball fields in search of new heroes. It was a summer that marked the beginning of a sports rivalry unequaled in the annals of athletic competition.

The Black Dahlia
by James Ellroy
In this fictionalized treatment of a real case, Bucky Bleichert and Lee Blanchard, both L.A. cops obsessed with the Black Dahlia, journey through the seamy underside of Hollywood to the core of the dead girl’s twisted life.
Year: 1987
Genre: 1940s, Crime Fiction, Los Angeles

The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway
by Ernest Hemingway
In this definitive collection of Ernest Hemingway's short stories, readers will delight in the author's most beloved classics such as The Snows of Kilimanjaro, Hills Like White Elephants, and A Clean, Well-Lighted Place, and will discover seven new tales published for the first time in this collection. For Hemingway fans The Complete Short Stories is an invaluable treasure.
My Library | |||||||||||||||
Own | Read | Rating | Wish | Year | Title | Author | Series | Genres & Tags | |||||||
-- | -- | -- | -- | 2004 | 1942 | Winston Groom | 1940s, World War II | ||||||||
-- | -- | -- | -- | 1999 | Motherless Brooklyn | Jonathan Lethem | 1940s, Conspiracy, Private Eye, New York City | ||||||||
-- | -- | -- | -- | 1989 | Summer of '49 | David Halberstam | 1940s, Baseball | ||||||||
-- | -- | -- | -- | 1987 | The Black Dahlia | James Ellroy | L.A. Quartet | 1940s, Crime Fiction, Los Angeles | |||||||
-- | -- | -- | -- | The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway | Ernest Hemingway | 1930s, 1940s | |||||||||
-- | -- | -- | -- | 2015 | The Einstein Prophecy | Robert Masello | 1940s, Historical, Thriller | ||||||||
-- | -- | -- | -- | 2018 | The Reckoning | John Grisham | 1940s, Courtroom Drama, Southern Gothic, World War II | ||||||||
-- | -- | -- | -- | 2015 | World Gone by | Dennis Lehane | Coughlin | 1940s |