Showing results by narrator "Annie Aldington" in All Categories

In a life of crime, loyalty means everything - even if you don’t always see eye to eye. But when Vaughn Sadler speaks up to get Franny Doyle sent down, he’s broken every rule in the book to win checkmate. Holed up in prison, Franny has more than one score to settle - but she’s starting with Vaughn. Because you don’t grass on your own, no matter what. And though she may be behind bars, she will get revenge - whatever the cost. 

Beautiful, dark-haired Lily has been abandoned in a Birmingham slum as a tiny child. With few clues as to her identity she endures a childhood of loneliness and loss. At eighteen she applies for a post as nanny with the family of a Captain Fairford, a soldier in Ambala, north India and his...

The female private detective has been a staple of popular culture for over 150 years. But what about the real-life women behind these fictional tales? Dismissed as 'Mrs Sherlock Holmes' or amateurish Miss Marples, mocked as private dicks or honey trappers, they have been investigating crime since the mid-nineteenth century - everything from theft and fraud to romance scams and murder. In Private Inquiries, Caitlin Davies traces the history of the UK's female investigators.

Birmingham, 1858: Dora, a spirited young maid with a vivid imagination, finds solace in the library of the esteemed family she works for. But when a forbidden love leads to a secret that could ruin her, Dora has no choice but to leave the only place that has ever offered her security and...

Flame-haired beauty Chloe Collard watched her mother struggle through life, scraping together pennies in order to provide for her and her brothers, so Chloe promised herself something a long time ago: she would get a proper education and make something of herself. This vow would carry Chloe through her entire life. When Chloe is offered a job as a personal assistant in a prestigious firm, she finally feels that her hard work is paying off.

Sean O'Donnell, small-time villain and loyal family man, walked out on his family nineteen years ago and hasn't been heard of since. Now his daughter Iris has returned to the East End in the hope of finding out what happened. But it isn't going to be easy. Everyone close to Iris, including her mother, seems intent on keeping the truth hidden. With the rest of her life in a mess, Iris struggles to make sense of her murky family history. But a chance meeting with the mysterious Guy Wilder changes everything.

One summer day Clara Marshall vanished without trace. A few days later, her children, six-year-old Lorraine and five-year-old Janine, also disappeared and were never seen again. Richard Marshall, Clara's heartbroken husband, claimed he had discovered his wife was having an affair with an Australian backpacker and that she had run away with him, taking the children with her, destroying the family for ever.

Like a princess in a fairytale, Grace Hamilton has been showered with blessings: professional success, a happy marriage, and she even lives in a beautiful castle. But the only thing she really wants – her heart’s desire – is the one thing she can never have. Her sister, the beautiful Susannah, has made a mess of her life. Like a reverse Midas, everything she touches turns sour. But fate puts Grace’s future in Susannah’s hands, changing the balance of power between the sisters forever.

For Rose Lucas, a spirited, intelligent girl born into a large family in the slums of pre-war Birmingham, life is hard. But through her friendship with Diana, daughter of a vicar from middle-class Moseley, she learns to aspire to a different and better existence. But life seldom follows dreams, and after losing a love she has fought hard for, and after travelling in Italy, she returns to Birmingham with her hopes shattered. But Rose's powerful spirit will not be defeated.

After her murderous ex-boyfriend who she turned in to the police was released from prison, Jem Byrne fled to London, desperate to hide herself in the hustle of the big city. Now she spends every day watching her back, waiting for him to catch up with her. But The Mansfield estate is far from a safe place to hide, and Jem soon learns she's only ever one wrong move away from being found out - and sold out.

Kent, 1828. Lizzie Carey of Castle Bay is trapped in a life she never chose - endless days of cooking, cleaning, and caring for her five younger siblings after her elder sister Nell's marriage. She longs to escape, but it seems like an impossible dream. That is, until she meets the enigmatic Mrs. Simmonds, who promises Lizzie a future far beyond the confines of her small town. The allure of a new life in Canterbury draws Lizzie into a world she never imagined, but it soon becomes clear that nothing is as it seems . . .

Can the Woolworth girls achieve their dreams in time for their futures to begin? The Woolworths Saturday Girls is the seventh instalment in Elaine Everest's much-loved Woolworths series. 1950. The Second World War is over and life has moved on for the Woolworth girls, Sarah, Maisie and Freda. In...

The Woolworth Girl’s Promise is the heart warming eighth novel in Elaine Everest’s bestselling Woolworths series that follows the turbulent life of a much-loved Woolworth girl. After losing her beloved fiancé at Ypres in 1917, seventeen-year-old Elizabeth Billington faces a lonely future...

It's 1952 and with a new Monarch about to ascend the thrown, The Woolworths Girls will face fresh new challenges . . . At The Erith Store there is a new temporary manager and Sarah is getting more than a little concerned by problems he seems to be creating. The whole mess is enough to make her...

From Annie Murray, the bestselling author of Chocolate Girls, The Bells of Bournville Green and Secrets of the Chocolate Girls, Wartime for the Chocolate Girls is a gritty family saga about love, war and chocolate . . . April 1941. Almost losing her life in a bomb blast while serving in the...

Welcome to HMP Ashcroft. An institution run by a corrupt governor whose determination to impose his will at any cost will have far-reaching consequences on all the inmates. Within these walls, friendships are forged that will last beyond a sentence, but some inmates can turn in the blink of an...

'A heart-warming and affecting tale.' - Woman's Weekly Homecoming for the Chocolate Girls is the heartfelt and dramatic conclusion to this gritty family saga about love, war and chocolate. 1946: The war might be over, but for the Gilby family there are still battles to be fought at home...

It is 1942, and with the country still at war, the girls who work for Joe Lyons are praying for their loved ones to return home safely. Happily married, Rose is busy with staffing problems at the teashop with many women taking on war work. Rose dreams of her husband’s return while trying to...

When Charity Browne arrives at The Fitzroy Hotel on her way to a country house party, she knows there's more to the invitation than a weekend of revelry. She's old enough to be married and her family are hoping for a good match. Sparks fly when she collides with dashing Jack Carter, the hotel housekeeper's disreputable brother. A visit to a home for waifs and strays makes Charity question her values.

Life on the river has never been easy for Tilly and Sam, but they've built a home filled with love. Joey, Tilly's eldest son, has straddled two worlds - cherished as her child but granted privileges, denied to her other children, through his wealthy birth father's family. It's a fine balance that has always held . . . until an incident at a glittering Celebration Ball shatters the fragile harmony. Tilly fears the consequences, especially when her headstrong daughter Martha is involved. How will Martha cope when she meets Joey's entitled friends and their easy lives?