Showing results by narrator "Imogen Church" in All Categories

1816. A massive volcanic eruption has caused the worst storms that Europe has seen in decades, yet Percy and Mary Shelley have chosen to visit the infamous Lord Byron at his villa on Lake Geneva. It wasn't their idea: Mary's eighteen-year-old step-sister, Claire Clairmont, insisted. But the reason for Claire's visit is more pressing than a summer escape with the most famous writers in the world. She's pregnant with Byron's child - a child Byron doesn't want, and scarcely believes is his own.

April Clarke-Cliveden was the first person Hannah Jones met at Oxford. Vivacious, bright, occasionally vicious, and the ultimate It girl, she quickly pulled Hannah into her dazzling orbit. Together, they developed a group of devoted and inseparable friends—Will, Hugh, Ryan, and Emily—during their first term. By the end of the year, April was dead. Now, a decade later, Hannah and Will are expecting their first child, and the man convicted of killing April, former Oxford porter John Neville, has died in prison.

Beth Haldane is worried. First, her dear friend and fellow single mother Jen suddenly gets married to a new man who seems too perfect to be true, then she moves out of leafy Dulwich Village—and now seems to have disappeared without a trace. Beth knows Jen would never leave her little daughter to handle playground predicaments or her sneaky stepmother alone. Heading to Jen’s new home for answers, Beth’s knocks on the front door go unanswered. Police are convinced the lovebirds are on an extended honeymoon, but Beth suspects Jen’s new husband is up to no good.

Emma loves her husband, Leo, and their young daughter, Ruby: she’d do anything for them. But almost everything she's told them about herself is a lie. And she might just have got away with it, if it weren’t for her husband’s job. Leo is an obituary writer, and Emma is a well-known marine biologist, so when she suffers a serious illness, Leo copes by doing what he knows best - reading and writing about her life. But as he starts to unravel her past, he discovers the woman he loves doesn’t really exist. Even her name is fictitious.

1940. Cora Mayhew came to Paris to search for her birth mother and stayed to work for the resistance movement. When Cora's train is struck by Nazi bombs, the only thoughts on her mind as she staggers from the wreckage are to escape to return to her family, and to post the heart-wrenching letter clutched in her hand. Then a German soldier finds and saves Cora. Max Heller is nothing like she would have expected: kind, good-humoured and selfless. Cora can't help falling in love with him as he helps to plot her escape.

Amber is happy. She loves her husband, David, and their dog, Sadie; she even loves her job as a junior editor on a local newspaper. But when the body of a young woman is found in a stretch of river near her home, Amber’s world begins to implode. The headaches that she has been struggling with seem to intensify, and Amber begins to doubt her husband. Why doesn’t he want to probe deeper into the story, and why does she seem to have such a shaky hold on her own thoughts and memories?

Tor, Cress and Kate have been best friends for as long as they can remember. Through all the challenges of marriage, raising children and maintaining their high-flying careers, they have stuck together as a powerful and loyal force to be reckoned with - living proof that 21st-century women can have it all, and do. It is only when the captivating Harry comes into their lives that things begin to get complicated, as Tor, Cress and Kate are drawn into Harry's dangerous games....

Hyperorganised and formidable, Eve Starkey defeated her boss, the louche magical adept and billionaire Rupert de Montfort Bigge, in a supernatural duel to the death. Now she's in charge of the Bigge Corporation, just in time to discover the lethal trap Rupert set for her long ago....

Anne Willan, multi-award-winning culinary historian, cookbook writer, teacher, and founder of La Varenne Cooking School in Paris, explores the lives and work of women cookbook authors whose essential books have defined cooking over the past 300 years. Beginning with the first published cookbook by Hannah Woolley in 1661 to the early colonial days to the transformative popular works by Fannie Farmer, Irma Rombauer, Julia Child, Edna Lewis, Marcella Hazan, and up to Alice Waters working today.

So I’m knocked up again. Preggers. Up the duff. Or to put it another way...whoops. And I am in NO WAY prepared for the shit-storm of pregnancy. While Nick and I get our heads around unexpected parenthood, I’m having all the usual pregnancy symptoms: throwing up, indigestion, sciatica, constipation, migraines, and brain-fuddling tiredness.

Maggie has everything her sister Rose always wanted. A handsome husband and two adorable children, Emily and Elliot. But what Rose doesn’t see is that Maggie is struggling. Every day is a fog of sleep loss and mess made by two tiny children. Left alone in her distress by husband Stephen, Maggie drifts ever closer to the edge. When Maggie finally cracks, walking out one day and not returning, Rose is right there to step into the breach.

Adele Astaire was a glittering, glamorous star, dancing with her brother, Fred, endearing herself to audiences from New York to London. But although she is toasted by royalty and beloved by countless fans, Adele Astaire has dreams of a loving husband and a houseful of children. And when she meets Lord Charles Cavendish, her wishes may just come true—but at what cost?

Under Cancún’s hard blue sky, a beach boy provides a canvas for tourists’ desires, seeing deep into the world’s underbelly. An enigmatic encounter in Copenhagen takes an IT consultant down a rabbit hole of speculation that proves more seductive than sex. The collapse of a love triangle in London leads to a dangerous, hypnotic addiction. In the Nevada desert, a grieving man tries to merge with an unearthly machine.

You never forget your first case.... Police Constable Jane Bennett is back on the beat after a spell away from the force. Working with the Serious Case Team, she's witnessed some of the worst crimes and endured them all. With her eye on promotion, Jane attends each call-out without complaint, determined to show her superiors her dedication. However, nothing could prepare her for this next case. Behind the ordinary façade of someone's home, she discovers a truly chilling scene.

Dead Woman's Ditch. The site of a grisly 200-year-old murder - and a recent hit-and-run. When a young woman's body is found at the macabre landmark in Somerset's Quantock Hills, DI Mike Lockyer and Sergeant Jane Bennett are called in to investigate. They find a community gripped by fear and superstition. The locals won't venture out at night, believing there's a man stalking the hills - a phantom cloaked in folklore and legend, keeping the sinister legacy of Dead Woman's Ditch alive.

Could you condemn one child to save another? In a near-future Europe fracturing under climate change and far-right politics, biologist Lina Stephenson works in the remote Rila Mountains. But when an old enemy dies, Lina's dangerous past resurfaces and puts her family's lives at risk. Trapped with her vulnerable sister and the dead man's family, Lina is facing pressure from all sides: her enemy's eldest son is determined to destroy her in his search for vengeance, whilst his youngest carries a sinister secret.

The perfect husband. The perfect stepson. The perfect lie? When Rachel marries dark, handsome David, everything seems to fall into place. Swept from single life in London to the beautiful Carnhallow House in Cornwall, she gains wealth, love, and an affectionate stepson, Jamie. But then Jamie's behavior changes, and Rachel's perfect life begins to unravel. He makes disturbing predictions, claiming to be haunted by the specter of his late mother - David's previous wife. Is this Jamie's way of punishing Rachel, or is he far more traumatized than she thought?

The Snakes exposes the damage wreaked by parents on children as observed by a new member of the family, Dan, a mixed-race man from Peckham who marries Bea, the daughter who refuses to take any of her father’s filthy money. But when Bea’s brother, Alex (who runs a shabby hotel in Paligny, France), dies suddenly in unexplained circumstances, the confusion and suspicion which arise bring other dark family secrets - and violence - to the surface. And none of the family, even the good members, go untouched.

Blackthorn Ashes was meant to be their forever home. For the first six families moving into the exclusive new housing development, it was a chance to live a peaceful life on the cliffs overlooking the Cornish sea, safe in the knowledge that it had been created just for them. But six weeks later, paradise is lost. Six people are dead. And Blackthorn Ashes is left abandoned and unfinished, its dark shadows hiding all manner of secrets.

Nell Ballard is a runaway. A former foster child with a dark secret she is desperate to keep, all Nell wants is to find a place she can belong. So when a job comes up at Starling Villas, home to the enigmatic Robin Wilder, she seizes the opportunity with both hands. But her new lodgings may not be the safe haven that she was hoping for. Her employer lives by a set of rigid rules, and she soon sees that he is hiding secrets of his own.