Showing results by narrator "Juanita McMahon" in All Categories

London, 1893. When Cora Seaborne's controlling husband dies, she steps into her new life as a widow with as much relief as sadness. Along with her son Francis - a curious, obsessive boy - she leaves town for Essex, in the hope that fresh air and open space will provide refuge.

Married couple, Miranda and David, move out of London into a beautiful country house with an idyllic garden. But reality turns out to be very different from their bucolic dream. Soon the latent unhappiness in the family begins to come to the surface, isolating each family member in a bubble of resentment and loneliness. Then a mysterious Frenchman arrives on their doorstep. With the wisdom of nature, he slowly begins to heal the past and the present.

Forty-four years ago, as any schoolgirl can tell you, the moth's eggs hatched and an army of caterpillars spread their tiny toxic threads on every breath of wind. Since then, men have been cloistered, protected from birth against the deadly poison. But now there's a vaccine—a way that men can leave the facility without dying or suffering from psychosis. Emerging, into their new world, eyes wide with wonder at every new experience, the truth soon becomes clear. This world was not made for men. And they are not safe.

A seaside holiday at Shell Cottage in Devon has always been the perfect escape for the Tarrant family. But this year everything has changed. Following her husband's recent death, Olivia is struggling to pick up the pieces. Harriet's looking forward to a break with her lovely husband, Robert, and teenage daughter, Molly. But unknown to Harriet, Robert is hiding a secret - and so, for that matter, is Molly....

Gianluca's life is empty. His City job, his seven-figure income, his glossy girlfriends - all have long ceased to satisfy him. His marriage is over, and he barely knows his young daughters. In search of serenity and a deeper purpose, he flees to Italy. But life on the sun-drenched Amalfi coast is not as peaceful as Luca anticipates.

As dusk falls, a young man staggers through a park, far from home, bleeding from a stab wound. He dies where he falls, cradled by a stranger, a woman's name on his lips in his last seconds of life. DI Manon Bradshaw can't help taking an interest - these days she handles only cold cases, but the man died just yards from the police station where she works. She's horrified to discover that both victim and prime suspect are more closely linked to her than she could have imagined.

All Linda wants to do is sleep. She won’t look at her husband. She can’t stand her daughter. And she doesn’t want to have this baby. Having this baby means moving on, and she just wants to go back to before. Before their family was torn apart, before the blame was placed. Alienated by their own guilt and struggling to cope, the Sadler family unravels. They grow up, grow apart, never talking about their terrible secret. That is until Linda’s daughter finds out she’s pregnant. Before she brings another Sadler into the world, Bea needs to know what happened twenty-five years ago.

A stunning story of loss, love and the summer that changed everything from the number one best-selling author of Songs of Love and War. 1958. Celestria, the charismatic daughter of an aristocratic family, lives in Pendrift Hall, a pale stone mansion with gardens that tumble down to the Cornish sea. It is summer, and the weeks ahead hold the promise of self-discovery and the thrilling possibility of illicit love affairs.

Out they came, away from natural predators, nesting in damp corners and in the tops of trees, crossbreeding with common cousins and laying thousands upon thousands of eggs. 'Then...the eggs hatched and an army of hungry caterpillars spread their tiny toxic threads on every breath of wind.’ The threads spell doom for humanity - half of it, at least. All around the world, men are dying in their sleep or turning into rage-fuelled killers. The world, as we know it, ends. However, humanity adapts and society moves on.

She hardly knew her Italian mother, and her English father acts as if Valentina never existed. She despises country life almost as much as she despises her stepmother and stepsisters. On board the houseboat named after her dead mother, Alba's life is little more than a selfish search for fun and pleasure. But the discovery of her mother's portrait sends the girl back to Italy to find her family - and the truth about Valentina.

There is one great love in everyone's life. For Ducky, Princess Victoria Melita, hers was a Romanov cousin, a member of the doomed Russian royal family. Her father is Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, Queen Victoria's second son. Her mother is Grand Duchess Marie, the daughter of Tsar Alexander III. Ducky seems doomed to be a pawn on her grandmother's dynastic chessboard. But Ducky is not so easily controlled.

Her whole world hinged on the moment one man jumped.... On a perfect summer's day in Paris, tourists on a river trip watch in horror as drama unfolds. A small boy has fallen overboard and disappeared below the surface of the water. As his mother stands frozen to the spot, another passenger jumps....

This is the story of how a single act of courage transforms the lives of all those involved. Louise Candlish returns with her most page-turning and emotional story to date.

A young man is found hanging from a tree, with nothing to identify him. Was he driven to suicide, or was he silenced? Somebody knows, but they’re not saying. With potential witnesses too scared to talk to her, can DI Manon Bradshaw discover the truth before more innocent people die?

Never has an unexpected guest caused such chaos! Three couples take it in turns to host a monthly dinner party. Beth, Sarah and Marie have been friends forever. Now they are grown up, with busy lives, busy husbands, busy kids...but they still find time to meet up over dinner once a month. A cosy, comfortable gathering of happy couples - or so they thought. Until one night, someone brings along a last-minute guest whose wife has just left him.

Six months ago, city girl Sophie Mills gave up everything to move to Cornwall. All to be with the man she thinks she loves, and his two daughters who she knows she loves. But adjusting to life as a semi-permanent mother in the countryside isn't quite as easy as Sophie imagined it would be.

In 1960s Marrakech a young girl travels to meet her estranged grandmother. Vicky Baudin steps on to the train through Morocco looking for the truth about the woman who gave her father up for adoption decades before. Clemence Petier lives in a kasbah on the edge of the Atlas Mountains, her background shrouded in mystery. But the past holds secrets that threaten them both. A face from Clemence’s childhood threatens to expose everything she has built a life to hide.

Meet the daughters of Iris Parker. Dee, sensitive and big-hearted; Rose, uptight and controlled; and Fleur, the reckless free spirit. At the reading of their mother's will, the three estranged women are aghast to discover that their inheritance comes with very tricky strings attached. If they are to inherit her wealth, they must spend a series of weekends together over the course of a year and carry out their mother's bucket list.

Set in and around the women's prison at Milbank in the 1870's, Affinity is an eerie and utterly compelling ghost story, a complex and intriguing literary mystery, and a poignant love story with an unexpected twist in the tale. Following the death of her father, Margaret Prior has decided to pursue some 'good work' with the lady criminals of one of London's most notorious gaols. Surrounded by prisoners, murderers, and common thieves, Margaret feels herself drawn to one of the prison's more unlikely inmates.

Moving back through the 1940s, through air raids, blacked out streets, illicit liaisons, sexual adventure, to end with its beginning in 1941, The Night Watch is the work of a truly brilliant and compelling storyteller. This is the story of four Londoners, three women and a young man with a past, drawn with absolute truth and intimacy.

On Emilia Morris's thirteenth birthday, her mother Rachel moves into a tent at the bottom of their garden. From that day on, she never says another word. Inspired by her vow of silence, other women join her and together they build the Community. Eight years later, Rachel and thousands of her followers around the world burn themselves to death.