For little Blanche the future appears bleak. Then one fateful day Blanche's mother is requested at the 'big house' to nurse Marianne, the motherless daughter of John Savill whose wife has died in childbirth. The two girls, so different in their hopes, are brought up together caring for each other as sisters. Blanche is torn between her love for her real mother and her desire for a life of wealth and ease. Her friendship with Marianne remains the one constant in her life. But then she meets Marianne's intended husband, with tragic consequences for them all. In this original and vivid saga, Jess Foley weaves a tale of passion and pain against a background of unsentimentalized rural England.

    While her husband Kenneth spends his days on the golf course, she is busy overseeing her beautiful house and gardens, and organising unforgettable events, surrounded by friends who hang on to her every word. Her life is a reflection of herself – impossibly perfect. Until the day that Hedda Harvey-Smith and her husband Charles move into the village. Into an even grander home than hers. Taking the front seat on the social scene, quite literally. That simply will not do. Flappy is determined to show Hedda how things are done here in Badley Compton. But then she looks into Charles’s beautiful green eyes. And suddenly, her focus is elsewhere. She is only human, after all…

    . .It’s 1981. Eleven-year-old Sadie adores her beautiful and vibrant mother, Connie, whose dreams of making it big as a singer fill their tiny house in Leeds. It’s always been just the two of them. Until the unthinkable happens.Jean hasn’t seen her good-for-nothing daughter Connie since she ran away from the family home in Harlow – or Pram Town as its inhabitants affectionately call it – aged seventeen and pregnant.But in the wake of the Royal Wedding, Jean gets a life-changing call: could she please come and collect the granddaughter she’s never met?We all know how Charles and Diana turned out, and Jean and Sadie are hardly a match made in heaven – but is there hope of a happy ending for them?Written in Joanna Nadin’s trademark dazzling prose, The Talk of Pram Town tells the story of three generations of Earnshaws and asks whether it always has to be like mother, like daughter . .

    With his six young daughters, he moves into rented rooms in a Merseyside back street. Meanwhile, Hattie and Maggie, the eldest girls, are trying to hold the family together. Sophie Dransfield's husband, Daniel, takes pity on the poverty-stricken Knells and offers Maggie a job as a maid in the Dransfields' nursery. Maggie's beautiful blonde hair soon catches the eye of Sophie's brother Tom, whose dashing brother, Luke, is equally enchanted by Hattie when she joins the household as a lady's maid. But the fortunes of the two sisters do not run according to plan...

    Having never cooked a day in her life, she is terrified of being found out and banished to the cotton fields as was her mother before her. But when she accidentally burns the freedom papers of Jonathan Mayfield, a handsome free man of color to whom she's attracted, her fear of the fields becomes secondary.A gifted cabinetmaker, Jonathan Mayfield's heart is set on finally becoming a respected businessman by outfitting a bedroom at the palatial Riverwood—until a beautiful new slave destroys his proof of freedom and his fragile confidence along with it. When the mistress of Riverwood orders Dinah to work alongside the sullen Mr. Mayfield, sparks fly setting the two on a collision course. Is their mutual love for God strong enough to overcome deep-seated insecurities and set the couple on a path toward self-acceptance and love for each other?

    . . and done with trying to find "perfect" husbands. So why can't Hahna, Twila, and Kimberly have men strictly for friendship, companionship—and especially mind-blowing sex? Their solution: be sugar mamas to gorgeous young studs who promise the best of having it all. But the ladies soon find that real lust and no strings is way more complicated than they thought . . .All-business and all about the money, Hahna is drawn to Jovan, an aspiring writer. He's content with his work and Hahna, but her determination to make him appreciate the finest things in life could easily tear them apart. Cautious Kimberly is swept off her feet by handsome adrenaline-junkie Shawn—but an old flame from her past sparks an even more dangerous passion. And for Twila, a smokin'-hot Instagram model is fulfilling all her scandalous, insatiable dreams . . . until his high-maintenance demands and jealousy throw her life into chaos. Now Hahna, Kimberly, and Twila need to trust their instincts and their hearts to reclaim their joy—and the love they truly deserve.

    Rome, 1953: Hal, an itinerant journalist flailing in the post-war darkness, has come to the Eternal City to lose himself and to seek absolution for the thing that haunts him. One evening he finds himself on the steps of a palazzo, walking into a world of privilege and light. Here, on a rooftop above the city, he meets the mysterious Stella. Hal and Stella are from different worlds, but their connection is magnetic. Together, they escape the crowded party and imagine a different life, even if it's just for a night. Yet Stella vanishes all too quickly, and Hal is certain their paths won't cross again. But a year later they are unexpectedly thrown together, after Hal receives an invitation he cannot resist. An Italian Contessa asks him to assist on a trip of a lifetime -- acting as a reporter on a tremendous yacht, skimming its way along the Italian coast toward Cannes film festival, the most famous artists and movie stars of the day gathered to promote a new film. Of all the luminaries aboard -- an Italian ingénue, an American star, a reclusive director -- only one holds Hal in thrall: Stella. And while each has a past that belies the gilded surface, Stella has the most to hide. As Hal's obsession with Stella grows, he becomes determined to bring back the girl she once was, the girl who's been confined to history. An irresistibly entertaining and atmospheric novel set in some of the world's most glamorous locales, The Invitation is a sultry love story about the ways in which the secrets of the past stay with us -- no matter how much we try to escape them.

     Gervaise Belmont, Viscount Woodridge, has sworn to no longer gamble – but giving it up is proving far harder than he had expected. He despairs of achieving his aims, especially as the reputation he created, two years earlier, persists, destroying his opportunities for change. Until a chance meeting with a young lady gives him a reason to hope. Miss Clarisse Weston is disconsolate. Her father has, after many, many years, married again – and her relationship with her stepmother is strained, to say the least. When she is encouraged to look for a husband, she feels trapped. Whilst her father has introduced her to a charming Earl, she finds herself uncertain – especially as the Viscount she met by accident wishes to court her too. But all is not as it seems, and a tangle of lies, deceptions and betrayals soon traps Clarisse. Is the Earl all that he seems? Is the Viscount truly a rake and a gambler beyond redemption? Is her stepmother as concerned for Clarisse’s wellbeing as she professes to be? And can Clarisse find her way through the web of deceit, to be with the man she loves, or will greed and manipulation steal her chance at happiness forever?

    She vows to find a man on every continent for some pure no-strings-attached fun. Adriana is stunning and can have any man she desires.Yet she wants an eligible bachelor who'll slip a five-carat Harry Winston diamond on her finger. Leigh has a doting boyfriend that most girls would kill for. But when literary bad boy Jesse Chapman asks to work with her, she just can't refuse. Knocking back raspberry mojitos one night, the three friends make a pact - to change one thing in their lives by the end of the year. Game On. (Large Print Edition)

    Life has been cruel and now it lands another blow. Luckily, she has her best friend Karen by her side to help her through. Then a chance encounter on the French Riviera leads Trish to think that maybe la vie est belle after all.Karen has it all. Sophisticated and successful, she is head of a Maternity & Fertility Clinic in Dublin’s city centre. Now, a new man who ticks all the boxes looks like he might be ‘The One’.Olivia is the perfect daughter with a steady boyfriend and a steadier job. But she wants answers. Haunted by the fact that her life has been a matter of chance, she is on a mission to unearth the truth.But, for each of them, the truth has the potential to blow their lives apart.

    The lonely young Appalachian woman joins the historical Pack Horse Library Project of Kentucky and becomes a librarian, riding across slippery creek beds and up treacherous mountains on her faithful mule to deliver books and other reading material to the impoverished hill people of Eastern Kentucky.Along her dangerous route, Cussy, known to the mountain folk as Bluet, confronts those suspicious of her damselfly-blue skin and the government's new book program. She befriends hardscrabble and complex fellow Kentuckians, and is fiercely determined to bring comfort and joy, instill literacy, and give to those who have nothing, a bookly respite, a fleeting retreat to faraway lands.

    Robert can’t speak. He can’t tell her what makes him happy or sad. Nell has to work that out for herself. Not everyone is happy about Robert’s existence. Can Nell save him from a desolate future, secure his inheritance and ensure he takes his rightful place in society? A love story.

    Every year the children have looked forward to spending the summer with their grandmother in Nantucket: but this year Blair, the oldest sister, is marooned in Boston, pregnant with twins and unable to travel. Middle sister Kirby, a nursing student, is caught up in the thrilling vortex of civil rights protests, a passion which takes her to Martha's Vineyard with her best friend, Mary Jo Kopechne. Only son Tiger is an infantry soldier, recently deployed to Vietnam. Thirteen-year-old Jessie suddenly feels like an only child, marooned in the house with her out-of-touch grandmother who is hiding some secrets of her own. As the summer heats up, Teddy Kennedy sinks a car in Chappaquiddick, a man flies to the moon, and Jessie experiences some sinking and flying herself, as she grows into her own body and mind.

    

    Because in the end, music can save us all ...1988. Frank owns a music shop. It is jam-packed with records of every speed, size and genre. Classical, jazz, punk – as long as it’s vinyl he sells it. Day after day Frank finds his customers the music they need.Then into his life walks Ilse Brauchmann.Ilse asks Frank to teach her about music. His instinct is to turn and run. And yet he is drawn to this strangely still, mysterious woman with her pea-green coat and her eyes as black as vinyl. But Ilse is not what she seems. And Frank has old wounds that threaten to re-open and a past he will never leave behind ...