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BOOK LIST:

The War at Home

Updated: June 1, 2019

Fiction about World War II on the U.S. homefront.


Book cover for Dream when you're feeling blue : a novel
Dream when you're feeling blue : a novel
Berg, Elizabeth.
With their sweethearts fighting on the front lines, the three Heaney sisters learn about love and sacrifice in a novel that richly evokes 1940s Chicago.

Book cover for Grace
Grace
Wood, Jane Roberts, 1929-
Through the stories of four families, Wood's novel explores the impact of World War II on a small Texas town.

Book cover for Guard of honor
Guard of honor
Cozzens, James Gould, 1903-1978.
Call Number: Ed.a
This story about racial tension on a Florida Army air base won the Pulitzer Prize in 1949.

Book cover for I wish this war were over
I wish this war were over
O'Hehir, Diana, 1929-
Set against the backdrop of World War II's final days, O'Hehir's Pulitzer-nominated novel centers around a teenage girl who travels cross-country to save her alcoholic mother.

Book cover for The legend of fire horse woman
The legend of fire horse woman
Houston, Jeanne Wakatsuki.
The author of the memoir Farewell to Manzanar's first novel is a semi-autobiographical account of three generations of women living in a Japanese internment camp.

Book cover for Loose lips
Loose lips
Brown, Rita Mae.
Two bickering small town sisters open a beauty parlor and do their patriotic duty by volunteering for the Civil Air Patrol.

Book cover for Love and war in California
Love and war in California
Hall, Oakley M.
This bildungsroman follows Payton Daltry, a college student, and his internal conflict over how to best serve his country after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

Book cover for The magic of ordinary days
The magic of ordinary days
Creel, Ann Howard.
A young pregnant woman is pushed into an arranged marriage and sent to live on a farm in rural Colorado. Here, she befriends two Japanese girls living in an internment camp near her farm.

Book cover for Prisoners of war : a novel
Prisoners of war : a novel
Yarbrough, Steve, 1956-
Dan Timms is counting down the days until he's old enough to enlist so he can escape from his father's suicide, his mother's infidelity, and the depressed Mississippi farming community he calls home.

Book cover for That year of our war
That year of our war
Goldreich, Gloria.
A chronicle of the last year of World War II through the eyes of a 15-year-old Jewish girl living with her extended family in New York City.

Book cover for The whisper of the river
The whisper of the river
Sams, Ferrol, 1922-
The second in Sams's trilogy of semi-autobiographical novels follows prankster Porter Osborne to college, to medical school, and finally to war.

Book cover for Wild embers
Wild embers
Bunkley, Anita R.
Janelle Roy is an Army nurse who falls in love with a pilot at the Tuskegee air base in this story of racial segregation in the U.S. military.

Book cover for A woman's place : a novel
A woman's place : a novel
Austin, Lynn N.
Austin, a well-known author of Christian fiction, explores gender roles and marriage in this story of four women who become unlikely friends when they take "Rosie the Riveter" jobs in a Michigan shipyard.

Book cover for Words of my roaring
Words of my roaring
Finney, Ernest J.
Finney's fictional account of a "liberty town" outside of San Francisco is told through the eyes of soldiers in training at the naval base, civilian residents, and Japanese-Americans held in internment camps there.

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