Showing results by narrator "Colleen Prendergast" in All Categories

Three South Yorkshire friends, all on the cusp of 40, fall pregnant at the same time following a visit to an ancient fertility symbol. For Helen, it's a dream come true, although her husband is not as thrilled about it as she had hoped. Not only wrestling with painful ghosts of the past, Helen has to deal with the fact that her outwardly perfect marriage is crumbling before her eyes. For Janey, it is an unmitigated disaster as she has just been offered the career break of a life-time.

Football fans will love this insight into the life and mind of Big Sam. With nearly 20 years as a player - plus almost 25 years as a coach and manager - under his belt, Sam Allardyce is one of the most recognisable figures in British football. 'Big Sam' has been a robust defensive general throughout the seventies and eighties, and an imposing touchline presence as a gaffer since 1994. Over the last four decades, Allardyce has seen it all.

On the beaches and cliffs of North Devon, lone women have become victims in a terrifying game where only one player knows the rules - and, when those rules change, the new game is murder. But that madman on the loose feels very far from the crumbling, seaside home of 10-year-old Ruby Trick. Instead of living in fear of him, she lives in fear of school bullies, the dark forest crowding her house into the sea, and the threat of her parents' divorce. So when she decides to help her father catch the killer, it seems like a good way to keep her father close.

When the naked, battered body of an unidentified teenager is found dumped in an alleyway, postmortem finds evidence of a harrowing series of events. Another teenage death with the same MO pushes DI Hannah Robbins and her team on the Nottingham City division Major Crimes Unit to their limits - and across county borders.

Young Sara Crewe grew up in a well-to-do household, but she suddenly finds herself impoverished when her father, Captain Crewe, dies penniless in India. Sara is forced to abandon her life of privilege for a life of bare existence at Miss Minchin's boarding school. To survive those hard times, she imagines herself to be a princess as she awaits her rescue from a mysterious benefactor.

Maxine Connolly has had a rough year with the loss of her mum, marriage, and job in quick succession, and she’d be the first to admit that she hasn’t been coping. But when her teenage daughter, Sophie, applies for a job at the Comfort Food Café on her behalf, Max realises she’s let things get out of hand. So when the job offer comes, Max decides to embrace this unexpected opportunity and uproot her life for a fresh start on the south coast.

Shay Bastable is the woman in the middle. She is part of the sandwich generation: caring for her parents and her children, supporting her husband Bruce, holding them all together and caring for them as best she can. Then the arrival of a large orange skip on her mother’s estate sets in motion a series of events leading to the collapse of Shay’s world, forcing her to put herself first. But in order to move forward, Shay needs to make sense of her past. And so she returns to the little village she grew up in to uncover the truth about what happened to her when she was younger.

In What Just Happened?! Marina Hyde slashes her way through the hellscape of post-referendum politics, where the chaos never stops. Clamber aboard as we relive every inspirational moment of magic, from David Cameron to Theresa May to Boris Johnson.

When Lou Winterpicks up a dog-eared magazine in the dentist's waiting room and spots an article about clearing clutter, she little realises how it will change her life. What begins as an earnest spring clean soon spirals out of control. Lou's loved ones grow disgruntled. Why is clearing out cupboards suddenly more important than making his breakfast, her husband, Phil, wonders? The truth is, the more rubbish Lou lets go of, the more light and air can get to those painful, closed-up places at the centre of her heart.

Ella Farrell has reached breaking point. Shattered by her job and her boyfriend’s recent betrayal, she grabs her stuff and flees down the coast. When her car breaks down a few miles short of Cornwall, she’s astonished by what she finds. Not on any map, the tiny seaside village of Starshine Cove is too perfect for words. A cobbled lane lined with pretty, thatched cottages slopes towards a pristine white beach… has she finally lost it, or is this place for real?

Kate seems to have it all – wonderful friends, a successful career, and an idyllic life in the quirky Yorkshire town of Essendale. But under the surface, Kate is lonely and yearns for family – especially at Christmas. With the holidays approaching and the town desperate to attract more visitors, Kate plans an enchanting living Advent calendar to feature the local businesses. But Kate’s picture-perfect plans take an unexpected turn when her ex-boyfriend returns, determined to create the pivotal Christmas Eve display. Will she let go of the past and embrace the future she dreams of?

SPLASH! A mysterious thing lands in Rabbit and Bear's peaceful summer lake. Is it exciting, or terrifying? Is it a tiny fluffy owl, or a huge hungry monster? And has Rabbit finally met a creature with worse habits than himself? Rabbit's sure he can solve this mystery. But when he accidentally turns the best day ever into the worst day ever, he needs Bear's help.... From novelist and playwright Julian Gough and the winner of the Roald Dahl Funny Prize Jim Field, this is a tale of friendship, acceptance and what you can do with blueberry poo.

Hildur Rúnarsdottir is the only police detective in the isolated Westfjords of Iceland, desperately trying to forget her traumatic past by burying herself in her cases. Once Jakob Johanson, a Finnish police trainee with a knitting hobby, begins to work alongside Hildur to escape his own complicated life, it becomes clear that neither can keep their pasts away for long. But when a local man is found with his throat slit, underneath an avalanche that has buried much of the evidence, Hildur and Jakob must set their own problems aside and unravel the dark secrets and a killer that the fjords hide.

Romance writer and single mum Stevie Honeywell has only weeks to go to her wedding when her fiancé Matthew runs off with her glamorous new friend Jo MacLean. It feels like history repeating itself for Stevie, but this time she is determined to win back her man. She isn't going to act as he might expect. She isn't going to wail and dig her heels in; she is simply going to pretend to let him go whilst she pursues a mad course of dieting, exercising and self-improvement.

On a snowy winter morning, an abandoned shipping container is discovered near Reykjavík. Inside are the bodies of five young women - one of them barely alive. As Icelandic Police detective Daníel struggles to investigate the most brutal crime of his career, Áróra looks into the background of a suspicious man, who turns out to be engaged to Daníel's former wife, and the connections don't stop there.

Three women controlled by one man—their charismatic husband Elijah, leader of their cult who dictates every aspect of life in the remote Scottish settlement of Halcyon. But cracks have begun to form in the community's idyllic facade, and Elijah's increasingly erratic behavior begins to test the loyalty of the women who love him, especially when he reveals his intention to take a fourth wife, sixteen-year-old Mim. Deceived and isolated by the husband they share, Aoife, Ruth, and Deborah must set years of animosity aside and come together as danger mounts within their isolated community.

Lucy Brown has spent years hiding from the world, as far away as she could get from her old life–and her ex-husband–back in London. But when she reluctantly agrees to leave her safe haven to attend her old friend Ella’s wedding in Starshine Cove, little does she know what’s in store for her down in Dorset… When a chance airport encounter with a handsome stranger unexpectedly leads to a deeper connection, Lucy finds her trip becoming much more than just a last-minute holiday. But then her dark past comes knocking, just as she always feared it would.

It’s December 1902, and Rose O’Leary is looking forward to her baby girl’s first Christmas. But then tragedy strikes: her husband dies at the shipyard where he works, and within days his friend Nathaniel makes it plain he’s determined to have her. Rose flees with her child but soon finds the world is a cruel place for a beautiful woman with no protection. More tragedy ensues, and yet, although she’s bruised and broken, Rose is a fighter.

Mara lives with her father in a drought-stricken village, where rain comes at a price controlled by powerful cloud-makers. Without enough water, the village crops, animals and people will continue to suffer. When Mara’s father’s illness takes a turn for the worse, she sneaks to The Cloud Factory in the hopes a healthy cloud will help him. But stealing a cloud isn’t simple, as Mara soon finds – and she begins to discover the secrets behind The Cloud Factory.

Gaby Mortimer is the woman who has it all. But everything changes when she finds a body near her home. She's shaken and haunted by the image of the lifeless young woman and frightened that the killer, still at large, could strike again. Before long the police have a lead. The evidence points to a very clear suspect, one Gaby never saw coming.