The Deluge

The Deluge is an historical novel by Polish author Henryk Sienkiewicz. The second book in The Trilogy, it is set in the mid-17th century, and focuses on the The Deluge, a series of military campaigns in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Six years after the events of With Fire and Sword, the state has managed to recover from the violent wars with the Cossacks and the Crimean Khanate. However, the peace is short-lived when the ambitious Swedish King Charles X Gustav sets his sights on the wealthy land of the Commonwealth. As soldiers and nobles alike, struggle to determine their allegiances, Andrei Kmita demonstrates his loyalties and recklessness, putting his comrades as well as his fiancée, Aleksandra Billevich, in peril. With a mixture of fictional and real historical characters, The Deluge is a richly detailed and action-packed novel that explores the political and social situation of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the brutality of war, the impact of these events on the lives of ordinary people, and the struggle for power and survival in a time of war and chaos.

This book has 487,438 words, and was originally published in 1886. This translation by Jeremiah Curtin was first published in 1891.