Studying hard to please them, she earns a place at Cardiff University. Here she is swept off her feet by handsome Gwyn Roberts, but when she becomes pregnant her parents are devastated and turn her from their door. All Gwyn and Sarah can afford are two squalid rooms in the infamous slums of Cardiff and Sarah soon realises she's made a terrible mistake. Gwyn becomes increasingly distant and when the baby dies in infancy, he leaves Sarah with little choice but to fall on her parents' mercy. But just when Sarah is starting to pull her life back together again, she is drawn to the charms of Stefan Vaughan and finds herself in trouble once more...

    Her main aim in life is to escape and she sees marriage as her best way out. When Peter Wesley, First Officer aboard a cruise ship, proposes, she accepts eagerly.The Wesleys have a baby, Diana, and all seems set fair for the small family, but Peter is killed and Emmy left penniless. She and Diana are forced to move back to Nightingale Court. Emmy has to take work as a waitress but she becomes ill and when suitors appear, Diana detests them all...A tale of hardship, heartbreak and hope from a beloved storyteller, Two Penn'orth of Sky is classic Katie Flynn and sure to delight every one of her readers.

    Only those who know them best realize that Milly's dark brown eyes hide a wild, untamed wantonness, while Beth's silvery-grey ones betray her idealism and kindness.But the only man in the room either of them wants is the one who could destroy both their lives. Hugh, sixteenth Lord Thornley, is a rake who needs to marry an heiress to restore the fortune his father gambled away. Even a lowly daughter of a glass manufacturer will do - provided she is biddable and strong and willing to bear the son he needs. Beth, he decides, will make him the perfect wife. But it is Milly who traps him into a loveless marriage - and sets in motion a chain of events that could destroy everything they hold dear.

    Her escape is achieved just before the disastrous advent of Hitler, and there is further tragedy to come.Follow her through childhood and adolescence, then on into her twenties when, finally made whole, she wins her own battle for freedom, for love and for her own place in the world.

    When the legitimacy of her twin babies with Edgar is called into question, the tiny infants are taken from Beth and sent far away. James is adopted by Edgar's uncle, the very wealthy Lord Redfern, master of Redfern Abbey. But little Daisy is sent to a cold-hearted childless couple who raise her to be a maid rather than a daughter. When Daisy, at 16, finally escapes her hard life with her adoptive brother Boyd, they arrive at the Abbey to seek work and refuge. Little does Daisy know that her flesh and blood is the next in line to be Lord of the Abbey. There is a strange connection between Daisy and James, something they can neither explain nor ignore. But will the truth be discovered in time?

    But Emmy is beautiful, so attracts unwanted attention; her mother's protector has his eye on her, as does evil Marcus Armistead, her employer's nephew. Marcus is excited by Emmy's virginity and has her kidnapped, but Emmy hits him over the head and escapes.Marcus, further enraged, kills her mother and becomes even more determined to rape Emmy, but the combined efforts of the local parson and Emmy's young suitor manage to keep her safe from harm. Finally Emmy sees Marcus get his just desserts, finds out who her father was and attains the respectability she has so longed for.©2005 Anna Jacobs (P)2009 Isis Publishing Ltd

    When the letters she eagerly awaits never arrive, Rosie is disillusioned and open to the influence of Doug. Finding herself pregnant, she is forced to marry Doug - but then a letter arrives from Adam, saying he is coming home.

    Eileen Gillmoss, a colourful character with a smile forever lighting up her face was the life and soul of the party. Today was the day she'd prayed for and dreamed about. After five long, lonely years, her prisoner-of-war husband Bill would be coming home, back to the open, loving arms of his wife and children. But the man who comes back from the war is a complete stranger to her. It isn't only that Bill's appearance has changed. It's his remoteness, his flinching from her touch that Eileen can't cope with. Now, Eileen, who is always there to lend a shoulder to cry on, is the one in need. But who can she turn to? No one can give her what she craves most... her old husband back. She wants him back where he belongs, as the man of the house.

    The children arrived with a lot of kicking and screaming from the eldest…terrified of the changes going on in his life.One of our jobs as their carers was to minimise change as much as possible until their future was decided by the courts at the final hearing.There was much going on in the background that we were not aware of but would find out in the course of time.Plans were being made by professional people, who should know better and should never take advantage of their position to abuse those who are vulnerable and unable to defend themselves because they are told ‘The law is against you’, when actually what is meant is that they, in their powerful position are against you.We were slowly and blindly heading toward an adult temper tantrum that neither I nor any of the social workers present at the time, had ever witnessed before.A temper tantrum of such intensity that one person changed the course of these children’s lives.It was a truly, truly wicked act of power displayed by one very spiteful egotistical person.

    Their short honeymoon results in a baby, but on the birth of her daughter, Joy, Esther's world falls apart. Esther's dying mother confesses to a dark secret that she has kept to herself for twenty years: Esther is not her natural daughter but the result of an exchange of babies after her own child was stillborn. Esther's real mother was being forced to give up her baby to an orphanage by her furious family who were incensed about the unsuitability of their daughter's lover, and Joy's birth makes the reason clear. Harshly rejected by Monty, and with the man Esther believed was her father breathing fire and damnation, she takes her precious baby and leaves everything and everyone she's ever known, determined to fend for herself and her child. But her fight is just beginning . . .

    But soon the storm clouds of war engulf Europe and they suddenly find their idyllic family life thrown into chaos. Throughout the country young people hasten to join up, and Eileen watches anxiously as her two older girls do the same, one in the air force and one in the land army, while the youngest goes into a factory. With her family scattered and the war getting worse by the day, Eileen throws herself into the community, always on hand to help friends and neighbours when tragedy strikes, while savouring any rare moments of celebration.

    . . Even when, brutally overriding her refined sensibility, he imprisoned her in a mansion of overwhelming opulence, an accursed house that brought all who lived there grief. . . Even when, before her eyes, she saw him destroying their children with his misguided indulgence. . . For here was a man more powerful, more truly gigantic than any she had ever known, a man she knew she would love until death. . .

    She stopped at no lengths in her campaign to tear him to pieces both mentally and physically. In his chilling memoir, Alex describes how he received the most unnecessary and appalling treatment in mental institutions because of her actions, to the point where his mental and physical health deteriorated to a perilous state. Covering her tracks with cunning deception, his mother began by beating him repeatedly and forcing him to take a dangerous mix of amphetamines and Valium. His health already in balance, and raped by an uncle, the professionals believed his mother's lies. Mental asylums in Greece and the UK followed, as did isolation cells and ECT. But his mother's hatred was to take a more sinister turn still - how much more could Alex take and still survive? Not since Sickened has there been a book that catalogues a child's experience of being made devastatingly ill at the hands of their mother. Dramatic and uniquely shocking, this is a memoir that will haunt the reader long after they close the final page.

    With only the local church choir and the occasional dance at the village hall for amusement, she yearns for the bright lights. Spurning Morry Robinson's proposal of marriage, Kathy goes to live in the city with his aunt, Jemima Robinson. In turn, she finds employment for Kathy in a department store, but is anxious when Kathy is captivated by the sophisticated and handsome floor manager, Tony Kendall.'He has a reputation, ' the outspoken Jemima warns her. 'He's had more girl friends than I've got shoes in my closet.'Kathy has fallen deeply and irrevocably in love and, even when the country is plunged into war, she can see no obstacle to their future. But she has reckoned without the devious mind of Tony's invalid mother, Beatrice Kendall.'You'll never marry my son, ' she vows. 'I'll see to that.'Determined that the possessive woman won't win, Kathy plans her wedding, but the day is ruined and Tony is called up before another date can be arranged. Feeling deserted, Kathy is forced to face yet further heartache and shame alone. At last, she finds solace in joining a concert party entertaining service men and woman and war workers. But behind the songs and the smiles, her heart is breaking . . .

    Life isn't easy for widowed George Vannin and his young daughter, but somehow George has raised the child alone and Ellan adores her father. Ellan is ten years old when the shaft at Foxdale Mine collapses, and her father never comes up. From then on she lives with Aunt Maud, a dour woman with a quick temper. Her husband had died in a mining accident too, and she never forgave the family at the Big House for their part in the tragedy. When Ellan is offered a chance to better herself at the Big House, Aunt Maud savagely forbids it. Ellan's chance is yet to come, but she has a long way to go before she finds the happiness she deserves...