WBedelia is a novel by Vera Caspary first published in 1945 about a blissfully happy newlywed couple in which the husband learns that his wife may have a criminal past. His growing suspicion and discovery of corroborating evidence lead him to think that she might be a serial killer, and that he could be her next victim.
WBhimsa, the Dancing Bear is a children's novel by Christine Weston. Set in contemporary India, it follows the adventures of two boys, David and Gopali, as they roam the country with a dancing bear. The first edition was illustrated by Roger Duvoisin. The novel was first published in 1945 and was a Newbery Honor recipient in 1946.
WCannery Row is a novel by American author John Steinbeck, published in 1945. It is set during the Great Depression in Monterey, California, on a street lined with sardine canneries that is known as Cannery Row. The story revolves around the people living there: Lee Chong, the local grocer; Doc, a marine biologist; and Mack, the leader of a group of derelict people.
WCaptain from Castile is a historical adventure novel by author Samuel Shellabarger originally published in 1945.
WCass Timberlane is a romantic drama film starring Spencer Tracy, Lana Turner and Zachary Scott, directed by George Sidney, and released in the United States on January 9, 1948. It was based on the 1945 novel Cass Timberlane: A Novel of Husbands and Wives by Sinclair Lewis, which was Lewis' nineteenth novel and one of his last.
WThe City of Trembling Leaves (1945) is a novel in the semi-autobiographical genre, by Walter Van Tilburg Clark. The novel is a series of parallel narratives detailing the lives and work of a group of redacted characters named Tim Hazard, Lawrence Black, Mary Turner, Rachel Wells, Marjory Hale, "Walt", and assorted other side-characters.
WThe Clue in the Crumbling Wall is the twenty-second volume in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series. It was first published in 1945 under Carolyn Keene, a pseudonym of the ghostwriter Mildred Wirt Benson.
WComing Home is a novel by the American writer Lester Cohen (1901–1963) set in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
WThe Curse of the Bronze Lamp is a mystery novel by the American writer John Dickson Carr, who published it under the name of Carter Dickson. It is a locked room mystery or, more properly, a subset of that category known as an "impossible crime", and features the series detective Sir Henry Merrivale. Carr considered this one of his best impossible crime novels.
WDestiny Times Three is an alternate timeline 1945 science fiction novel by American writer Fritz Leiber. It first appeared in Astounding Science Fiction in March and April 1945. In 1952 it featured in Five Science Fiction Novels published by Gnome Press. Its first appearance as a standalone novel came in 1957 when published by Galaxy Science Fiction Novels.
WDragon Harvest is the sixth novel in Upton Sinclair's Lanny Budd series. First published in 1945, the story covers the period from 1938 to 1940.
WFocus is a 1945 novel by Arthur Miller which deals with issues of racism, particularly antisemitism. In 2001, a film version, starring William H. Macy, was released.
WThe Friendly Persuasion is an American novel published in 1945 by Jessamyn West. It was adapted as the motion picture Friendly Persuasion in 1956. The book consists of 14 vignettes about a Quaker farming family, the Birdwells, living near the town of Vernon in southern Indiana along "the banks of the Muscatatuck, where once the woods stretched, dark row on row." The Birdwells' farm, Maple Grove Nursery, was handed down to them by pioneering forebears who came west nearly fifty years before the onset of the novel. Originally published between 1940 and 1945 as individual stories in Prairie Schooner, Collier's, Harper's Bazaar, The Atlantic Monthly, the Ladies' Home Journal, New Mexico Quarterly Review, and Harper's Magazine, West had them reprinted in more or less chronological order covering a forty-year span of the Birdwell family's lives in the latter half of the 19th Century.
WHeaven to Betsy (1945) is the fifth volume in the Betsy-Tacy series by Maud Hart Lovelace. Heaven to Betsy, describing Betsy's first year in high school, is written for an older age group than the earlier Betsy-Tacy books. The book, along with the entire Betsy-Tracy and Deep Valley series, was republished in 2000 by HarperTrophy with a new cover art illustrated by Michael Koelsch.
WIf He Hollers Let Him Go is the first novel by American writer Chester Himes, published in 1945, about an African-American shipyard worker in Los Angeles during World War II. It earned him critical acclaim and was considered a "protest novel", in the tradition of Richard Wright.
WThe Indigo Necklace (1945), also published as The Indigo Necklace Murders, is a mystery novel by Frances Crane.
WJustin Morgan Had a Horse is an American children's historical novel by Marguerite Henry, illustrated by Wesley Dennis and published by Wilcox & Follett of Chicago in 1945. It concerns the real figures of Justin Morgan and his bay stallion Figure, who lived in Vermont in the late eighteenth century. It was a runner-up for the Newbery Medal in 1946.
WLucy Winchester is a novel by Mennonite author Christmas Carol Kauffman. It is a semi-biographical adaptation of the life of Bessie Viola Lain, published in 1945 by Herald Press, a Mennonite publishing house.
WThe Lurker at the Threshold is a horror novel by American writer August Derleth, based on short fragments written by H. P. Lovecraft, who died in 1937, and published as a collaboration between the two authors. According to S. T. Joshi, of the novel's 50,000 words, 1,200 were written by Lovecraft.
WThe Moved-Outers is a children's novel by Florence Crannell Means. Illustrated by Helen Blair, it was first published in 1945 and was a Newbery Honor recipient in 1946.
WThe Murderer Is a Fox is a novel that was published in 1945 by Ellery Queen. It is a mystery novel primarily set in the imaginary town of Wrightsville, US.
WOrpheus Emerged is a novella written by Jack Kerouac in 1945 when he was at Columbia University. The novella was discovered after his death and published in 2000.
WThe Short-Wave Mystery is Volume 24 in the original The Hardy Boys Mystery Stories published by Grosset & Dunlap.
WThe Singing Cave is a children's novel by Margaret Carver Leighton and illustrated by Manning de V. Lee. It was published in 1945 by Houghton Mifflin. It first appeared as a serial in the Christian Science Monitor in summer 1944.
WThe Small Rain is a semi-autobiographical novel by Madeleine L'Engle, about the many difficulties in the life of talented pianist Katherine Forrester between the ages of 10 and 19. Published in 1945 by the Vanguard Press, it was the first of L'Engle's long list of books, and was reprinted in 1984. L'Engle began work on it in college, and completed it while an actress in New York.
WStrawberry Girl is a Newbery Medal winning novel written and illustrated by Lois Lenski. First published in 1945, this realistic fiction children's book, set among the "Crackers" of rural Florida, is one in Lenski's series of regional novels.
WStuart Little is a 1945 American children's novel by E. B. White. It was White's first children's book, and it is now widely recognized as a classic in children's literature. Stuart Little was illustrated by the subsequently award-winning artist Garth Williams, also his first work for children.
WWhen the Birds Fly South is a lost race fantasy novel by American writer Stanton A. Coblentz, defined as a "significant tale ... involving avian theriomorphy." It was first published in hardcover by The Wings Press, Mill Valley, California in 1945 and reprinted in 1951. Its importance in the history of fantasy literature was recognized by its republication by the Newcastle Publishing Company as the twenty-third volume of the Newcastle Forgotten Fantasy Library in April, 1980. The Newcastle edition was the first paperback edition, and had a new introduction by the author. Later editions were issued by Arno Press (1978) and Borgo Press (1980).
WThe White Deer is a 96-page children's novel written by James Thurber in 1945. It is a fairy tale about the quest of the three sons of King Clode who are set perilous tasks to win the heart and hand of a princess without her memories who had once been a beautiful white deer. The cover and four color plates were illustrated by Don Freeman.
WThe White Dress is a standalone murder mystery novel by Mignon G. Eberhart published by Random House in 1945. It was reprinted as a mass market paperback in July, 1976, by Popular Library, and again in 1997 by Thorndike Press.
WThe White Tower is a 1945 novel by James Ramsey Ullman. It was the fourth best-selling novel in the US in 1945 and was reprinted as an Armed Services Edition.
WWitch House is a fantasy novel by American writer Evangeline Walton. It was published in 1945 by Arkham House in an edition of 3,000 copies. It was the first full-length novel to be published by Arkham House and was listed as the initial book in the Library of Arkham House Novels of Fantasy and Terror. An expanded version, with a newly written 20,000-word prologue, was published in England in 1950. In 2013, Centipede Press issued the first American edition of this revised version, also including previously unpublished writings by Walton and several of her short stories.