Perfect for the fans of Jo Cox and Rosie Goodwin. The boom years immediately after the Great War bring nothing but happiness for wealthy industrialist Wigmore Stratfield-Whyte and his wife Clarissa – until tragedy robs them of their greatest treasure. Many years later, an horrific fatal accident brings young Meg Chandler, a spirited farmer's daughter, into their lives. Meg wants nothing to do with them, but Clarissa is drawn irresistibly towards the bereaved girl and will move heaven and earth to help her. Will Meg allow Clarissa into her own shattered life, and can the two share a future happiness together? And will Meg's new acquaintances bring her the contentment she craves – or seek to destroy her? Set in the Kent countryside in the years leading up to the Second World War, this compelling saga tingles with drama, tension and an overwhelming sense of love.

    . . and the power of love to change lives. In 1926 the Holborn twins, Ginny and her blind sister Emily, disappear from their comfortable home in Wolverhampton. Why? No one knew. Ten years later, aspiring solicitor Charlie Commoner is dispatched to France to track them down. What he finds instead is a mystery, a tragedy and a love affair. But as the Second World War darkens over Europe, so, too, does the legacy from a terrifying disease that holds the family in its grip . . . As warmhearted as Maeve Binchy, as compulsive as The Shell Seekers, Two Silver Crosses is unputdownable. Beryl Kingston was born and brought up in Tooting. After taking her degree at London University, she taught English and Drama at various London schools as well as bringing up her three children. She and her husband now live in Sussex. Her other titles include Hearts and Farthings, Kisses and Ha’pennies, A Time to Love, Tuppenny Times, Fourpenny Flyer, Sixpenny Stalls, London Pride, and War Baby.

    But when Connie meets Charlie off the train at London Bridge, she finds that his homecoming isn't quite going to go according to plan... Connie's busy professional life, and the larger-than-life patients in the district, offer a welcome distraction, but for how long? If nursing in the East End has taught Connie anything, it's that life is full of surprises...

    Betrayal. Assassination. Rome, 133 b.c. Gaius Marius is back from war in the West. They fought for the peace and prosperity of Rome, but the legions return to find the Eternal City far less peaceful and prosperous than they had hoped. People are starving, homelessness abounds, war after war has overtaxed the legions. And the revolutionary tribune, Tiberius Gracchus, thinks he has a solution for everything. Political parties are developing, the people are up in arms, the senate is enraged. And Tiberius is at the center of it all. Before Marius has a chance to reacclimate to civilian life, he’s thrust into this political upheaval in Rome. His allegiances are put to the test as Rome is almost brought to the brink of civil war. For the first time in the history of the Republic, blood will be shed in the forum.

    When she tells her parents of her plans to follow her dream of becoming a doctor instead of marrying and having children, her mother refuses to acknowledge her wishes, seeing her decision as an embarrassment to the family.Meanwhile, in a poorer district of Dundee, Rosie Nesbitt lives a difficult life with her mother and siblings in a house that is too small for all of of them. Equally intelligent, Rosie decides that she wants to become a doctor and create a life for herself that is better than the one she has had growing up. She, too, faces issues - albeit different ones from those of Lucy - and she and her family must fight and make sacrifices for her to receive the education she needs. As the two girls' paths cross, their chosen career isn't the only thing they have in common. They first meet at a party hosted by Kier Anderson-Howard, a potential husband for Lucy, but an eligible man who has his sights set on Rosie.As war approaches, Lucy's and Rosie's lives become complicated by love and loss, and the paths leading to their goals testing their resolves to the limit.

    However, when she is seduced by a travelling actor, a handsome rogue she meets at the market, they are forced to marry, and Helen’s family disowns her. After several unhappy years, Helen and her husband escape to Europe, but their fortunes take a turn for the worse, and soon Helen is alone and responsible for both herself and their son. Two years later, in the picturesque Italian town of Serugia, Helen meets Charles Carnforth. An older man, he falls deeply in love with her… but he’s not the only one trying to win Helen’s heart. Can a new romance find its way into her life, with all the complications and turmoil that brings? Seasons of Love is both a remarkable story of a woman fighting for her independence and a deeply moving saga that will tug at the heartstrings. Penned by one of Britain’s best-loved novelists, Anna Jacobs, it is ideal also for fans of Gill Paul or Kitty Neale.

    In 1907, he strikes off on his own, keen to prove himself an able worker on the new railroad. It's being cut through steep mountainsides and across deep gullies to join the two ends of the Main Trunk Line. Also drawn to the remote worker settlements are miners from Denniston, young men fresh off the boat, sly-groggers, temperance campaigners, women following their menfolk, local Maori and a varied assortment of people after a new life or a quick buck.Among them is a preacher, Gabriel Locke, who is running from a shady past and determined to avoid the daily grind. With untimely and suspicious deaths, the horrendous weather, impossible deadlines and the rugged landscape, it will take a lot more than a leap of faith for this disparate group to complete the railroad and build the magnificent Makatote viaduct . . .

    Warm and comforting, just like her pies, Florence is always there as a helping hand or a shoulder to cry on, especially to her full house of family and friends. There's six year old niece Josefina, left with Florence by her wayward sister, Stella.Rose Marie, Florence's younger sister, in search of adventures of her own. And Manny, invalided out of the First World War, and in need of a job and a place to rest his head.But working in the pie shop every day and taking care of others leaves Florence little time to look after herself. What will happen when it all becomes too much? And will Florence ever find her own shoulder to cry on?

    Kitty Clegg has always accepted the hard work of her job as a kitchen maid at the manor farm. But now, at sixteen, she seizes the chance to go up in the world and become a lady's maid. Handsome Jack Thorndyke has held Kitty's adoring gaze more than once. As he prepares his gleaming threshing engine for its winter work, he finally asks her to be his chosen Harvest Nell when the last of the golden Lincolnshire corn is cut. Carried away by her excitement, Kitty fails to heed the warnings whispered into her ear that Jack is far from the marrying kind. Worse still, his playful charm has attracted another - a young girl far above his station. Will Kitty's dreams be scattered like Chaff upon the wind? Or can she hold on to a very special kind of love: a love which will bring both heartache and joy to the manor in the turbulent decades to come?

    With her children gone and her husband John in the army, Rene Morgan misses her family terribly. When she learnsthat John has become a prisoner of war, she has to take on the highly dangerous job of firewatcher. Meanwhile, Hazel and Peter are desperate to go backhome. Returning to the city, they are overjoyed to be reunited with their mother and Gran. But their father is still far away and the worst of the waris yet to come. As the air raids increase, the Morgans must face the terror of the Blitz together...

    Sixteen-year-old Poppy Percival turns up at the gates of Trout's clothing factory in Bethnal Green with no idea what her new life might have in store. There to start work as a seamstress and struggling to get to grips with the noise, dirt and devastation of East London, Poppy can't help but miss the quiet countryside of home. But Poppy harbours a dark secret - one that wrenched her away from all she knew and from which she is still suffering . . .And Poppy's not the only one with a secret. Each of her new friends at the factory is hiding something painful. Vera Shadwell, the forelady, has had a hard life with scars both visible and concealed; her sister Daisy has romantic notions that could get her in trouble; and Sal Fowler, a hardworking mother who worries about her two evacuated boys for good reason. Bound by ties of friendship, loyalty and family, the devastating events of the war will throw each of their lives into turmoil but also bring these women closer to each other than they could ever have imagined.

    Once it had been a forbidding place of exile, inhabited by thousands of the disease’s victims who had been removed from their families and confined against their will, far away from a society that feared and misunderstood their condition. When Brooke Jarvis came across a posting for a job in Kalaupapa, tending to the needs of the handful of remaining patients, it seemed like an impossibly exotic opportunity for a college student. But what she found there was both more remarkable and more familiar than what she had imagined. When We Are Called to Part is the absorbing, affecting, and often funny story of life in the last years of a rapidly vanishing community. “Even a prison,” she would learn, “eventually becomes a home, becomes something you mourn.”

    For Helena Al-Khoury, life as an immigrant has been full of loneliness and despair. On the long road that has taken her from her family home in the Lebanon to the bustling port of Liverpool, the slums of Chicago, and finally to the Canadian wilderness, the struggle to overcome heartbreak, loss and cruel hardship has taken a heavy toll. Now, at last, with the constant support of Joe, her devoted lover, she has developed into a strong, independent woman.When unexpected circumstances take her back across the Atlantic to Liverpool, Helena is offered the chance to take over the family business, and to become a success in her own right. Yet with her love far away on another continent, she feels torn apart. Soon the tragedies of the past and the challenges of the future threaten to overwhelm her…

    When her sister Eden visits her, she is sent away with a stinging slap, to prevent her from catching the predatory eye of Myra's mistress. Puzzled by her sister's behaviour, she sets off to make her way in the world.

    Working as a supervisor on a production line for planes, Hildy believes she is doing her part to help with the war effort. But troubles at home, with her dependent and overly-protective mother, make it harder for her to findhappiness as she hides her relationship with an American GI.Meanwhile, Cora has lost both her parents in the Blitz and is still reeling from the devastating loss. Along with her friend, Belle, the two young women turn to the dark streets of Southampton to work on the game, wishing to raise enough money for a new beginning elsewhere and put their pasts behind them.For all three women, the war provides challenges and hardships that they will only emerge from by maintaining courage, strength and, above all, hope.