(besides Dumas please) Need a historical fiction novel that's adventurous and somewhat faster-paced to learn about life and history in 1600's Europe.
Appreciate any suggestions!
I've previously written a post with some advice for what one can learn from reading fiction that is a primary source on a period, but I have to say that if you want to learn about life and history in 1600s Europe ... you should not go looking in fiction. You'll often find highly researched material culture or vocabulary in good historical fiction, but you will also often find a lot of unquestioned modern dynamics - it's easier to research specialized terms than to read books on social history.
Here are some books I would recommend:
Court Lady and Country Wife: Royal Privilege and Civil War: Two Noble Sisters in Seventeenth-Century England by Lita-Rose Betcherman
The House of Hemp and Butter: A History of Old Riga by kevin C. O'Connor
Love, Intimacy and Power: Marriage and Patriarchy in Scotland, 1650-1850 by Katie Barclay
The Gentlewoman's Remembrance: Patriarchy, Piety, and Singlehood in Early Stuart England by Isaac Stephens
From Valor to Pedigree: Ideas of Nobility in France in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries by Ellery Schalk
Gender and Petty Violence in London, 1680-1720 by Jennine Hurl-Eamon
The Gentleman's Mistress: Illegitimate Relationships and Children, 1450-1640 by Tim Thornton and Katharine Carlton
The Cooke Sisters: Education, Piety, and Politics in Early Modern England by Gemma Allen
By Honor Bound: State and Society in Early Modern Russia by Nancy Shields Kollmann
Adapting to a New World: English Society in the Seventeenth-Century Chesapeake by James Horn
New Netherland: A Dutch Colony in Seventeenth-Century America by Jaap Jacobs
Colonization, Piracy, and Trade in Early Modern Europe: The Roles of Powerful Women and Queens, an edited volume