Showing results by narrator "Carole Boyd" in All Categories

Charlotte Drummond knows she has a duty to obey her father. Girls, especially well-bred upper-class ones, are expected to be submissive to the men in their lives. But Charlotte's father is a cruel man, viciously beating her and her brothers for the slightest reason. He even wants to marry her off, at just sixteen years old; to a man she does not love. Lion-hearted Charlotte wants to defy him but to protect her brothers from his fury she agrees to become the wife of Brooke Armstrong.

From an unusual weight-losing recipe found in an old notebook - and used with alarming consequences - to the queen of copy-cats who drives her neighbour mad with anger, Over The Gate is a hugely entertaining collection of tales from Fairacre, past and present.

Catherine Dessin, a young French girl living in Paris during the occupation, falls for an older, married German officer. The novel examines the tensions this causes within her family of patriots and resistance workers. Meanwhile Klaus, the German officer, who is Oxford educated and a professed Anglophile, faces his own moral dilemma as he comes to realise, through his love for Catherine and a tragedy in his own family, the true nature of the regime he is serving.

Tempestuous Briar Macauley's single-minded stubbornness to prove to the world that she is the equal to any man leads her into so many disastrous circumstances that her parents despair of ever making a lady of her. Encouraged by her equally disreputable friends, the only man who can stand up to her untamed spirit is Will Lucas of Browhead Farm whose temper matches her own.

'I will be good,' promised the thirteen-year-old Victoria, when she understood that she would be Queen of the most powerful country in the world. That, of course, is a matter of opinion. And there are other layers to the story. With a combination of novelistic flair and historical accuracy, Kate...

This classic story focusses on a naïve governess who takes charge of two children at the lonely House of Bly. When she begins to see ghosts, she believes that the children do too - with devastating consequences. More than just a simple tale of the supernatural, James poses questions about childhood innocence, corruption, and hysteria.

The pretty Arnold sisters have grown up on their father's farm and yearn for something more out of life than drudgery and toil. Ellen, loyal and honest, is her father's favourite, but Georgina is impulsive and unreliable, and can't please a father who has never shown her love.The big house, Grindle Hall, offers them both a chance of betterment, but while Ellen follows the steady path, Georgina takes a darker road and soon, her actions will have fateful consequences for them all. Only Ellen can help them, but will a sister's love be enough?

The brand new dramatic novel about the power of a father’s love, a little boy’s journey,and the desperate search for a place to call home, from Number 1 best-selling author Josephine Cox. Eight-year-old Casey’s mother Ruth is a cruel woman, with a weakness for other women’s husbands...

Rose Beechworth is mistress of a charming country house - her own, left to her by her wealthy father. In the summer of 1914, Alice Weatherly turns Rose's world upside down. The young heiress longs to kiss Captain Charlie Summers goodbye and so she takes Rose to Liverpool's Lime Street station and into the heart of Charlie's brother Harry.

One of the country’s bestselling storytellers joins HarperCollins with her new page-turning drama about struggle and triumph over adversity. The Beachcomber is the story of two people, each with a dream, each lonely in different ways, and just when everything seems to be coming right for them...

>No-one thought she had the courage.… Those looking in from the outside think Lucy Lovejoy's life is like any other, but at the centre of her family there is a big empty hole where all the love and warmth should be. 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 family, it's a wake-up call for Lucy. Everyone has taken a little piece of her, and she isn't sure who she is anymore.

Read by Carole Boyd. The new bestseller from the country’s number one storyteller is a deeply moving and powerful tale of love and courage and a sacrifice no man should be asked to make. The story begins in 1952 when three strangers meet in a churchyard. One is a local farmer, Ben Morris...

Maureen Bancroft has never learned the art of putting herself first. As a widow with a gentle temperament and humble ways, she’s been easy to take advantage of. All that changes when an unexpected windfall comes her way. Determined to make up for lost time, she decides to take a holiday and, needing a companion, looks up her friend Barbara Hayle. Glamorous, and with a successful career on the stage, Barbara seems to be everything that Maureen is not. But things aren’t as they seem, and what starts out as a nostalgic trip between friends becomes something different altogether.

When beautiful Tessa Harrison and her twin cousins take over their parents' Lancashire cotton mill, their luxurious upbringing has left them unprepared for their new responsibilities. For Tessa, there is an added but forbidden attraction at the mill. Foreman Will Broadbent, with his genuine understanding of the business and its workers, could not be more different from the dashing cousins. Yet, like the twins, he is hopelessly in love with this untameable girl.

Vibrant and headstrong, Ally Pearce loves working on the Edith, her family's narrow boat, proving she's the equal of any man on the Leeds to Liverpool canal. Betsy, delicate, calculating and sensuously beautiful, wants only to become a 'lady' - and will use the most unladylike means to become one. When Dr. Tom Hartley enters the sisters' lives after a tragic accident both are attracted to him - but for very different reasons.

England, 1936. A beloved king is dead, and by year’s end, the charismatic new monarch will give up his throne for love. The world is on the brink of war. And in the tumultuous intervening months, three outsiders will find themselves embroiled in the hidden truths, undeclared loves, unspoken sympathies, and covert complicities of a glittering high society in the throes of upheaval.

London, 1583. When young, aspiring playwright William Shakespeare encounters Lucy Morgan, one of Queen Elizabeth I’s ladies-in-waiting, the two fall passionately in love. He declares Lucy the inspiration for his work, but what secret is Will hiding from his muse? Meanwhile, Lucy has her own secret - and one that could destroy her world if exposed. No longer the chaste maid so valued by the Virgin Queen, she also bore witness to the clandestine wedding of Lettice Knollys and Robert Dudley, a match forbidden by the monarch.

The narrator is a young governess, sent off to a country house to take charge of two orphaned children. She finds a pleasant house and a comfortable housekeeper, while the children are beautiful and charming. But she soon begins to feel the presence of intense evil.

A heartwarming story set in 1940s Liverpool and Ireland about the hurdles two sisters, Chrissie and Grace, must cross on their journey to finding the happiness they seek. It's 1945 and the war is finally over. For the Devlin family in Liverpool, the wartime years have been almost too much to bear. But at long last sisters Grace and Chrissie can return to their normal lives. Level-headed and hard-working, Grace wants nothing more than to meet a nice man and settle down.

This is a collection of Marie Joseph's most outstanding short stories, previously published in magazines in the 1960s and 1970s. There is the young mother who eventually discovers nothing can compare with Christmas at home with her husband and children; a couple who are brought together again with unexpected help from a feline source; and a younger sister's wedding which brings faint misgivings and memories from the past. With compassion, insight and humour these stories explore the themes of love....