Showing results by narrator "Emma Powell" in All Categories

After Pearl's home is destroyed in the Exeter Blitz, so too are her dreams of performing onstage. Finding work as a bus conductress instead, a chance encounter revives her hopes once more, and soon she is singing for the troops alongside new friend Ivy. When agent Gordon Gold approaches them, Ivy jumps to sign with him and sets off for the bright lights of London. But Pearl is wary of the charming man and decides to stay, watching her friend go with a heavy heart. A year later, while Pearl is struck mute by an illness, Ivy returns - and is quick to seize the chance to fill Pearl's place.

Popstar Matteo Stanford is eager to escape to the sunshine island to catch up with his old friend Alex and secretly film his latest music video. But within moments of landing, the location for the shoot is leaked to the press, and his island escape and video might be over before they start. Not to be defeated, Alex’s girlfriend Piper recruits her two best friends Casey and Tara, who run the Smoke and Mirrors stall at the The Cabbage Patch market. It doesn’t take Casey more than a moment to realise the perfect setting for Matteo’s video is Gorey castle.

Jen is climbing in the mountains near Alajar, Spain. And it's nothing to do with the fact that an old acquaintance, Nick Crawford, may have suggested that she meet him there. But when things don't go as planned with Nick and her brother calls to voice concerns over the whereabouts of Morwenna - their estranged, free-spirited mother - Jen winds up travelling to a refugee camp on the south coast of Malta.

A mysterious key left by her murdered sister takes Air Transport Auxiliary pilot Betty Palmer on a journey of discovery and danger. Her estranged parents force themselves back into her life, motivated purely by greed and self-preservation. Penny's life is unexpectedly turned upside down by a potentially life-changing situation that causes her wounded husband to question their marriage.

1941. Maisie yearns for a family of her own. Raised as a charity orphan in a Catholic convent in Ireland, she believed she was all alone in the world. But when she is twelve, her world is turned upside down by a shocking revelation. She is uprooted from the only life she has ever known, and transplanted against her will to Plymouth, England. Family might not be all it's cracked up to be. But Maisie is resilient. She surrounds herself with a family of her own making. Then war breaks out across Europe and a horrific tragedy occurs during one of the worst nights of the Plymouth Blitz.

Molly had dared to turn a cold shoulder on London's prize catch. She was a precocious American upstart who thought beauty, brains, and bravery were enough to conquer London society. Well, he'd show her! Nobody publicly (or privately!) spurned Lord David Manley, the most eligible bachelor in town. He was determined that soon she'd be trembling in his arms, desperately in love with the man she had dared to mock. David Manley always got his way, and Miss Molly Maguire presented a challenge he couldn't resist!

Margate, 1884: When 17-year-old Hannah Bentley fled the family home, she never dreamed she’d find her feet working as a nurse on the children’s ward at the Royal Sea Bathing Infirmary. She adores her patients and the sea air, and looks forward to a time when she’ll have put away enough money so her younger sister can join her. But when her sister suddenly turns up unannounced, she brings more trouble than Hannah bargained for. As Hannah is forced to risk everything to keep her sister out of trouble, she must somehow find the strength to save herself too....

As a therapist, Cristina knows it's vital to keep her clients at a professional distance. That is until she meets new client Leon. Charming. Seductive. Dangerous. Leon comes to her grieving after the death of his married lover, Michelle. A woman Cristina realises used to be her client. As they work through his feelings in session after session in close proximity, ignoring her attraction to Leon is at first difficult...and soon impossible. But as she unravels the truth about his affair with Michelle, one thing becomes clear. Michelle's death was no accident. And Leon is involved.

Cornwall, 1861. Beth Jago appears to have the idyllic life, she has a trade to earn a living and a cottage of her own in Cornwall’s beautiful River Valley. Yet appearances can be deceptive...Beth has been receiving threats, so when she finds a man in her home she acts on her instincts. One frying pan to the head and she has robbed the handsome stranger of his memory and almost killed him. Fearful he may die, she reluctantly nurses the intruder back to health. Yet can she trust the man with no name who has entered her life, or is he as dangerous as his nightmares suggest?

Then: Madeleine lived for her children. She'd always believed she'd die for them, too. But on the morning of her twins' tenth birthday her love was put to the test when a killer knocked on their door and forced her to make a devastating choice: which child should live and which should die - her son or her daughter? Now: Madeleine stands silent on the periphery of her now fractured family, trying desperately to unravel why her world was so suddenly blown apart.

After her plans to elope with her married lover fall through, Rachel Kivell is brokenhearted and saddened that she must remain in her small Cornish mining town, with all of its dark secrets. But her brooding is put to an end when the loving but childlike Alice Bowden turns up on her doorstep. Poor orphaned Alice has nowhere to go, but Rachel cannot see herself taking on the responsibilities of a child. Can she put her worries aside, or will Alice never find a place to call home?

The Beast; that was what they called her. With her plump body and rough tomboy ways, she felt more like a clown. It was hopeless. Poor penniless Tilly could only sit among the chaperons as a paid companion to the spiteful Lady Aileen. The best she could do was sit; sit and dream. But suddenly Phillip, Marquess of Heppleford, the most eligible bachelor of all - decided he wanted her for himself, to be his wife, and they were married. His intent was to keep his freedom, fulfill the conditions of his father's will, and shock his aunts.

In any given glittering social season, Edwardian London's dizzying whirl had its share of surprises. The latest was Kitty Harrison, once achingly poor, suddenly an heiress and now, thanks to her determined mother, she was about to become a Baroness. From the moment Kitty set eyes on Lord Chesworth, she found him to be the most exciting man she had met. But Kitty was young, innocent, and easily dazzled.

Poor Ginny Bloggs! She had inherited a fortune, a magnificent country estate, and her benefactor's disgruntled relatives - a quartet of querulous schemers - who were horrified to find themselves suddenly at the mercy of a low, common girl; a total stranger - the coal merchant's daughter! The handsome Lord Gerald de Fremney himself had pledged to keep the more unruly relatives in line.

Polly was a bewitching young girl, that pretty Polly Marsh, and she knew it. She also knew that beauty could be her passport into the castles where she had always known she belonged. So she set her sights for a duke and joined the firm of Westerman's as a stenographer. Surely one of that noble family would notice her and then all of her dreams would come true!

In February 1944, the girls of the Air Transport Auxiliary Mystery Club face the devastating personal loss of one of their own in a tragic crash. At the same time, another member is blackmailed, whilst honeymoon plans of a third are threatened by a puzzling mystery. As they share each other's joys and troubles, the friends find the comfort and strength to go on with their vital work and dangerous investigations in wartime England, even when few situations are what they seem to be.

When Nora takes the train from London to visit her sister in the countryside, she expects to find her waiting at the station or at home cooking dinner. But when she walks into Rachel's familiar house, what she finds is entirely different: her sister has been the victim of a brutal murder. Stunned and adrift, Nora finds she can't return to her former life. An unsolved assault in the past has shaken her faith in the police, and she can't trust them to find her sister's killer.

Of all the weavers of magic, there is none like Lord Dunsany. During his long lifetime he wrote more than 60 books including novels, plays, poetry collections and most memorably, innumerable exotic and fantastical short stories. Here is the very best of Dunsany's extraordinarily evocative tales of Faerie, of dreamworlds and of magic.

Maddy fled the market town of Havenbury Magna three years ago, the scene of a traumatic incident she revisits most clearly in her dreams. Even so, when she is called back to help at the Havenbury Arms when her godfather, Patrick, suffers a heart attack, she is unprepared for the welter of emotions her return provokes. Psychologist and ex-army officer Ben finds himself falling for her. Then Maddy's mother, Helen, arrives, and Patrick himself must confront a few uncomfortable truths about his history and the pub's future.

It’s the 1960s, and Lily Denham is about to begin her studies at Oxford University. On her first day she meets Harry Gale and Max Farley, two fellow undergraduates who are both full of mischievous charm. The three of them become firm friends and enjoy exploring everything Oxford has to offer. However, Lily soon realises she’s falling for both of her newfound friends, men who might offer her two very different futures.