Showing titles in 20th Century

Elise Chevalier knows what it is to love…and to hate. Her fiancé, a young French soldier, was killed by the German army at the Maginot Line. Living amongst the enemy, Elise must keep her rage buried deep within. Sebastian Kleinhaus no longer recognizes himself. Forced to join the Third Reich and wear a uniform he despises, he longs for a way out. For someone, anyone, to be his salvation.

Weaving together the turbulent 1960s Civil Rights movement with the chaos within the Greater Hope Gospel United Church, Bowen carries a message of hope that transcends human failings. Young, handsome Rev. Theophilus Simmons and his new bride Essie settle into pastoral life as the "first couple" of the congregation.

The Bahamas, 1941. Newly widowed Leonora “Lulu” Randolph arrives in Nassau to investigate the governor and his wife for a New York society magazine. After all, American readers have an insatiable appetite for news of the duke and duchess of Windsor, that glamorous couple whose love affair nearly brought the British monarchy to its knees five years earlier. What more intriguing backdrop for their romance than a wartime Caribbean paradise, a colonial playground for kingpins of ill-gotten empires? Or so Lulu imagines.

1925. Among the ancient honey-coloured walls of the tiny island of Malta, strangers slip into the shadows and anyone can buy a new name. Rosalie Delacroix flees Paris for a dancer’s job in the bohemian clubs deep in its winding streets. 1944. Running from the brutality of war in France, Florence Baudin faces a new life. But her estranged mother makes a desperate request: to find her vanished sister, who went missing years before. Betrayals and secrets, lies and silence hang between the sisters.

The war is over, and Germany in ruins. Posted to an Allied-run Hamburg, reporter Georgie Young returns to the country she fled seven years prior – at the onset of the conflict – to find it unrecognisable. Amidst the stark horrors of a bombed-out city crumbling under the weight of millions of displaced souls, she discovers pockets of warmth: a violinist playing amidst the wreckage, couples dancing in the streets, and a nation trying to make amends.

When journalist Ella Franks is unmasked as a woman writing under a male pseudonym, she loses her job. But having risked everything to write, she refuses to be silenced and leaps at the chance to become a correspondent in war-torn France. Already entrenched in the thoroughly male arena of war reporting is feisty American photojournalist Danni Bradford. Together with her best friend and partner, Andy, she is determined to cover the events unfolding in Normandy. And to discover the whereabouts of Andy’s sister, who has followed a lover into the French Resistance.

1940: As the Germans advance upon Paris, young seamstress Estella Bissette is forced to flee everything she's ever known. She's bound for New York City with her signature gold dress, a few francs, and a dream: to make her mark on the world of fashion. Present day: Fabienne Bissette journeys to the Met's annual gala for an exhibit featuring the work of her grandmother - a legend of women's fashion design. But as Fabienne begins to learn more about her beloved grandmother's past, she uncovers a story of tragedy, heartbreak, and family secrets that will dramatically change her own life.

In a single, impulsive act, Susannah Faulconer, the daughter of one of the country's most powerful industrialists, follows her heart and finds herself severed from her family and everything familiar. Now she's the only woman in a world of men...and no etiquette book can teach her how to survive. There's Sam, the charismatic visionary; Yank, the fascinating inventor; and Mitch, the troubled corporate genius. Together, they will force Susannah into the biggest challenge of her life and a bold experiment that will change them all forever.

Seemingly overnight, the German blitzkrieg of Warsaw in 1939 turns its streets to a war zone and shatters the life of each citizen - Polish, Jewish, or otherwise. Sophie Kumiega, a British bride working in the city's library, awaits news of her husband, Janek, recently deployed with the Polish Air Force. Though Sophie is determined that she and the baby in her womb will stay safe, the days ahead will draw her into the plight of those around her, compelling her to help, whatever the danger.

The grandson of a Scottish clan laird, Duncan MacTavish is shocked to learn that his other grandfather was an English marquis whose title and London estate he is now required to take on. Worse still, he is engaged to a stranger who has mocked him in public. But his bride-to-be, Ophelia, has been guiding a lovely and witty, if dreadfully inexperienced, country girl named Sabrina through the latter's all-important first coming-out season.

It's 2014. Sensible Nora has always taken success for granted until suddenly her life begins to fall apart. Troubled by anxiety and nightmares, she finds herself drawn to the sweeping beaches of Tenby, a place she's been only once before. Together with a local girl, she rents a beautiful townhouse and slowly begins to settle in to her new life. But Tenby hides a secret, and Nora will soon discover that this little town by the sea has the power to heal even the most painful memories.

The Empire is not just a theatre. From music hall to vaudeville, from revue to grand musical spectacular, it holds a special place in the nation's heart. For its audience, for its actors and singers, for the stagehands, the front-of-house staff, for its backers and its debtors—and above all for its owners—it truly is a palace of dreams. And for young Jack Treadwell, struggling to adapt to civilian life after the horrors of the trenches, it's a lifeline. When he receives a letter out of the blue inviting him to work at The Empire, he leaps at the chance.

Claire arrives at her new job as researcher at a grand English country house, nursing a broken heart. But tucked into the back of a long-forgotten drawer she finds a letter written in an elegant hand. It tells of a wartime secret about the beautiful Lady Violet – whose passionate affair with an Italian prisoner of war scandalised the village and ended in tragedy. Captivated, Claire promises to find Violet’s daughter, Tabitha, and reunite her with a priceless piece of her mother’s jewellery. With only the name of an Italian bakery, Pasticceria Mancini, to guide her, and the help of her handsome neighbour Jim, Claire travels to Tabitha’s last known location – Florence.

Celebrate the miracle of love and the joy of the holiday season on the Western frontier with the Twelve Mail Order Brides of Christmas, a new Christmas Mail Order Bride Series from popular author Emma Morgan!

Faded photographs of a glamorous couple in postwar Europe. Old letters hinting of tragic loss. And a breathtaking array of magnificent jewelry, spectacular stones in exquisite settings. These are the contents of a safe-deposit box long abandoned in a New York City bank. If no heir can be identified, the jewelry will be auctioned. But who was the woman who left such a fortune and no will?

The third installment in the Wild Isles series from Sunday Times bestselling author Karen Swan. Flora MacQueen has always dreamt of more than life on the small Scottish island of St Kilda. So, when she catches the eye of visiting adventurer and wealthy businessman James Callaghan, her future seems brighter. Winter seas separate the lovers, but the island’s evacuation the following summer promises to reunite them – until tragedy strikes.

In the tradition of his beloved first novel, The Notebook, number-one New York Times best-selling author Nicholas Sparks brings listeners the remarkable story of two couples whose lives intersect in profound and surprising ways.

After years of scraping by, Caleb Murphy has graduated from college and is finally getting to start a new life. Except he suddenly has no way to get from Boston to Los Angeles. Then, to add to his misery, there’s perfect, privileged Peter Cabot offering to drive him. Peter Cabot would do pretty much anything to skip out on his father’s presidential campaign, including driving across the country with a classmate who can’t stand him. After all, he’s had plenty of practice with people not liking him much - his own family, for example.

1924. Ginger Kelly wakes up in tranquil Cocoa Beach, Florida, having fled south to safety in the company of disgraced Prohibition agent Oliver Anson Marshall and her newly-orphaned young sister, Patsy. But paradise is short-lived. Marshall is reinstated to the agency with suspicious haste and put to work patrolling for rumrunners on the high seas, from which he promptly disappears. Gin hurries north to rescue him, only to be trapped in an agonizing moral quandary by Marshall’s desperate mother.

Increasingly wary of her father's genetic research, Rachel Kramer has determined that this trip with him to Germany - in the summer of 1939 - will be her last. But a cryptic letter from her estranged friend, begging Rachel for help, changes everything. Married to SS officer Gerhardt Schlick, Kristine sees the dark tides turning and fears her husband views their daughter, Amelie, deaf since birth, as a blight on his Aryan bloodline.