Showing results by narrator "Jane McDowell" in All Categories

The best of the golden-age crime writers, praised by all the top modern writers in the field, including P. D. James and Ruth Rendell, Dorothy L. Sayers created the immortal Lord Peter Wimsey. But in this thrilling murder story, she tells her story instead through the letters of the victim and the suspects. The bed was broken and tilted grotesquely sideways. Harrison was sprawled over in a huddle of soiled blankets.

Sian Bishop has only ever experienced one moment of recklessness – a moment that resulted in her beloved son Rory. It’s not that she doesn’t love the outcome of that wild night, but since then she has always taken the safer route. So when dependable, devoted Richard suggests a move to the beautiful English countryside, she leaves the hustle and bustle of the city behind, and she throws herself into the picture-postcard cottage garden, her furniture restoration business, and a new life in the country.

James Blackwell is sexy and handsome and a fighter pilot - every girl's dream partner. At least that is what Diana Arnold thinks when her brother first introduces them. Before long they are in love and marry hastily just as war is declared. Then fate delivers what is the first of its cruel twists: James, the day of their wedding, is shot down over Northern France and killed. Diana is left not only a widow but pregnant with their child.

Stella lives with her mother, a smothering narcissist. Her world has shrunk since the terrible accident that left her a shut-in. Her days are broken up by deliveries from a courier that she always returns and by the irresistible urge to watch the life of a stranger - beautiful Connie - unfold on social media. But why is she so drawn to a woman she has never met? And what caused the accident she doesn't want to speak about? 

Not until she was16 did Stella Arnold learn the full truth about her father, how handsome, charming James turned out to be a cold-blooded, psychotic extortionist, racketeer and killer. Knowing now what her father was capable of, she decides to study psychology and the criminal mind, and to further her education in America. In the spring of 1962 she flies to Boston where, being beautiful, bright and fashionably English, she becomes someone of huge fascination and on every invitation list.

My name is not actually Penny Dreadful. It is Penelope Jones. The ‘Dreadful’ bit is my dad’s JOKE. But it is not even true that I am dreadful.

It's 1932 and 27-year-old Jessica is living London life to the full when her younger brother, Tim, an ancient Egyptian archaeology expert, goes missing. Teaming up with Sir Montague Chamford - who can resist neither a damsel in distress nor the chance of adventure - Jessie vows to find her beloved brother. Following the clues Tim has left in his wake, Jessie and Monty head to Egypt. In the relentless heat of the desert, romance is kindled between them, but danger also lurks in every shadow. And then Jessie starts to wonder how much Monty really knows about her brother's disappearance....

Brought to you by Penguin. For fans of BBC TV's hit series HARLOTS My tale is not for the faint of heart. Born illegitimate in eighteenth-century England, Henrietta Lightfoot reveals the truth about the events that shaped her in this candid confessional of a wide-eyed girl's journey to...

INTRODUCED BY PAUL BINDING 'I'm a huge fan of Barbara Pym' RICHARD OSMAN 'I'd sooner read a new Barbara Pym than a new Jane Austen' PHILIP LARKIN 'No novelist brings more telling observation or more gentle pleasure' JILLY COOPER Dulcie Mainwaring is always helping others, but never looks out for...

A lifetime ago, a patient escaped Nazareth mental asylum. They covered their tracks carefully. Or so they thought. Thirty years ago, Marianne Smy committed a crime then fled from her home to leave the past behind. Or so she thought. Now, Marianne has been forced to return. Nazareth asylum has been converted to luxury flats, but its terrible hold on her is still strong. A successful academic, a loving mother and a loyal wife, she fears her secret being revealed and her world shattering. She is right to be scared.

1915. Japanese-occupied Korea. Najin Han, the privileged daughter of a calligrapher, longs to choose her own destiny. When her traditional father seeks to marry her into an aristocratic family, her mother defies generations of obedient wives and instead sends Najin to serve in the King's court as a companion to a young princess. But the King is assassinated, and the centuries-old dynastic culture comes to an end.

She was young and beautiful, married to a famous author. They were celebrating their anniversary at their stunning country estate. So why did Julia Blake walk out of her perfect life, apparently leaving no trace? Seren, a junior reporter for the local paper, can't believe her luck when she lands an exclusive with Julia's husband, Max. But as Seren spends more time at the couple's remote mansion, probing ever deeper into the case, dark questions await. 

Italy, 1964. Maria Domenica is the eldest daughter in the Carrozza family from the tiny southern village of San Giulio. At 16, Maria's life is limited to the confines of her mother's rural kitchen (where she bakes bread every morning, the way the Carrozza women always have), and the Caffe Angeli, a place of friendship, strong espresso and famous ricotta sfolgliatelle. Her parents have high hopes for their beautiful first-born, but she has other plans.

‘A thrilling narrative that creates an extraordinary picture of female resistance’ The Lady ‘Fascinating’ Kavita Puri, BBC History Magazine ‘A fierce, intense picture of this aspect of the war . . . it will stay with me’ Elizabeth Buchan, author of Two Women in Rome On the evening of...

On a remote farm, an elderly woman takes a fall outside and, unable to move, is consumed overnight by two of her pigs. The victim was the renowned and reclusive photographer Sophie Bertilak - and the first photo she ever took remains her most infamous: a missing girl who was never seen again. Most strangely, inside the house, all the photos have been removed from their frames..

When Anna and David receive a phone call late one evening, their lives are upturned. Within minutes, they are travelling to the west coast of Scotland, preparing to care for two young sisters, tragically and suddenly orphaned. It's a beautiful place, the heather is in bloom, the birds wheel above the waves, the deer graze peacefully in the distance. But the large granite house is no longer a home for the girls, and Anna knows she can never take the place of their mother. Then David invites his friend to stay, to 'ease them through', and Anna finds herself increasingly isolated.

2019. When Henry Fox is found dead in his ancestral home in Cornwall, the police rule it a suicide, but his pregnant wife, Josie, believes it was murder. 1881. New bride Eliza arrives at Helygen House with high hopes for her marriage. Yet when she meets her new mother-in-law, an icy and forbidding woman, her dreams of a new life are dashed. Can Josie piece together the past to make sense of her present, or will the secrets of Helygen House and its inhabitants forever remain a mystery?

Fetishist of working women Arthur Munby, irascible antiquary General Pitt Rivers, feminist Barbara Bodichon, and other historical figures of the Victorian epoch wander through the backdrop of the novel as Anna's anomalous love for Lore Ritter, and her friendship with freethinking and ambitious Miriam Sala, carry her into areas of uncharted desire, while Beatrice, forced to choose between her beloved Will Anwyl and the evangelist Christian Ritter, who marked her out as a wife when she was only a child, is pulled between passion and duty.

The final compelling historical saga concluding a trilogy that began with Storms of War and The Edge of the Fall, from popular TV historian and critically-acclaimed author Kate Williams. The de Witt family, who once lead an idyllic and privileged life, are struggling to piece together the...

An Italian Summer is a novel about friendship, family secrets and second chances, set against the backdrop of Southern Italy. Sandy is in her 50s, and at a crossroads in her life: she's a teacher and respected by her pupils, but she feels she is being sidelined in favour of younger colleagues. So when her mother dies, leaving her a sealed envelope addressed to an unknown woman living in Naples, Sandy decides to head to Italy to resolve the mystery by delivering the letter herself.