Since the untimely death of her husband, young mother Effie Grey has been forced to live on a narrowboat owned by her tyrannical father-in-law Jacob. In spite of her own despair, she is determined to protect her brother Tom and her baby son Georgie from Jacob's bullying ways - for she is all they have in the world. But when Jacob hires villainous S...

The dramatic conclusion to the bestselling Deverill Chronicles. It is 1939, and peace has flourished since the Great War ended. Martha Wallace came to Dublin from her home in America to find her birth mother. But instead she has lost her heart to the impossibly charming JP Deverill. Bridie Doyle, now mistress of Castle Deverill, is determined to ma...

Artist's daughter Penelope Keeling can look back on a full and varied life: a Bohemian childhood in London and Cornwall, an unhappy wartime marriage, and the one man she truly loved. She has brought up three children - and learned to accept them as they are. Yet she is far too energetic and independent to settle sweetly into pensioned-off old-age....

With her shy smile and kind nature, Alice Jacobs wins the hearts of the Arnold family. Decent and well respected Tom and Nancy Arnold have raised two very different sons: Frank and Joe. Frank is a devious, brutal man, determined to have Alice for himself. So Joe, who has himself fallen in love with her, leaves home when they become engaged and only...

Molly and Jack's relationship is being torn apart by Jack's nightmares. Trapped in a place where he is taunted by eyes in the gloom, it is becoming harder for Molly to pull him free. Realising that he is being driven close to the edge, Jack decides to hunt for answers. It soon becomes clear that he must trace people from his past. But Jack could ne...

No-one thought she had the courage... Those looking in from the outside think Lucy Lovejoy's life is like any other, but over the years, her children have watched while their father chipped away at Lucy's self-confidence. Now the children are following their own paths, and Lucy has never felt more alone. When tragedy strikes at the heart of the fam...

1950s Liverpool. In the tight-knit community of the Four Streets, two girls are growing up. One is motherless and hated by the cold woman determined to take her dead mother's place. The other is hiding a dreadful secret which she dare not tell to anyone. The people of Four Streets laugh, grieve and hope together. But what can they do when a betraya...

Ellen Trawton is running away from it all-literally. She's getting married to a man she doesn't love, her job is depressing and her mother is getting on her nerves. So she escapes to the one place she knows her mother won't follow her-her aunt's house in rural Ireland. Once there, she uncovers a dark family secret-and a future she never knew she mi...

Santa Montefiore's involving and dramatic novel The Butterfly Box opens in Vina del Mar, Chile, in the sweltering Summer of 1982. Frederica Campione adores her father. When he gives her a magical box from Peru she believes he will always be there for her. Yet, when her parents' marriage falls apart, she is forced to move to Cornwall with her mother...

When seventeen-year-old Mary O'Connor collapses one Sunday in church she is taken to live with Dr Roberts and his wife in a beautiful Yorkshire village for her health. Though initially employed as a maid, Mary soon becomes the daughter the couple were never able to have. With Britain at war, unable to remain idle, Mary finds employment in the local...

On a bitter winter's day, an unnamed girl lies dangerously ill in hospital. When two coarse, rough-speaking individuals come to claim her, she can remember nothing of the events that brought her to her present state, not even her name. According to the men, she is their young sister, Lucy. As her health improves and her memory gradually returns, sh...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Remember Me by Lesley Pearse, read by Kerry Howard. She made one mistake, and now she'll never see home again . . . Mary, a Cornish mariner's daughter, makes the biggest mistake of her short life when she steals a silk hat. Convicted and sentenced to be transported to Australia, she endures horrific conditi...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Secrets by Lesley Pearse, read by Sophie Ablett. Without her mother she is alone in the world . . . Twelve-year-old Adele is placed in a bleak, cruel children's home after a family tragedy drives her mother to madness. But when trust is betrayed Adele has no choice but to run away . . . Alone and friendless...

Two young sisters sent far, far from home ... When tragedy deprives little Dulcie Taylor and her sister May of their parents, they are sent first to an orphanage and then shipped off to begin a new life in Australia. But the 'better life' the sisters are promised in this new and exciting country turns out to be a lie. It seems everyone who ever sto...

Leah Turner's father has been killed in an accident at the laundry, and since her mother died years ago it falls to her to become sole provider for her little sister. But women's wages are half those of men and pawning the few belongings she has left will only keep their vicious rent collector at bay for a few weeks, so even if she finds a job, the...

Lancashire, 1931. When Finn Carlisle loses his wife and unborn child, he spends a few years travelling to keep the sad memories at bay. Just as he's ready to settle down again, his great-uncle dies and leaves everything to him. This includes Heythorpe House in Ellindale, just down the road from Leah Willcox and her little fizzy drink factory. Finn...

Widower Harry Makepeace lives in Manchester with his sickly daughter, Cathie, scrimping and saving to get by. But after she suffers a violent asthma attack, the doctors say she must move to the clean, fresh air of the countryside to have any hope of survival. When Harry chances upon a patch of land for sale in Ellindale and an advert for a disused...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Charlie by Lesley Pearse. Her family is threatened and only she can save it . . . When sixteen-year-old Charlie witnesses a brutal attack on her mother by two strangers she is shocked and terrified. But after talking to the police she realises that her father's business dealings can't be so innocent. With h...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Father Unknown by Lesley Pearse, read by Lucinda Dryzek. Orphaned, lost. Who is she really? One young woman's search across the globe for a past - and a future . . . Losing her adopted mother threatens all she's ever had . . . Daisy was adopted. But when her mother dies, she finds her secure existence throw...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of A Lesser Evil by Lesley Pearse. She defied her parents to marry for love . . . Following her heart, Fifi moves with Dan to London where they rent a seedy flat in Dale Street, Kennington. Though Fifi must now become acquainted with squalor, she is soon drawn into the goings on behind the shabby front doors o...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Never Look Back by Lesley Pearse, read by Holli Dempsey. One good deed takes her into another world . . . Sixteen-year-old Matilda is a poor Covent Garden flower girl until the day she saves the life of Tabitha, a minister's daughter. Welcomed into Tabitha's family, Matilda is offered the chance of a lifeti...