Showing results by narrator "Patience Tomlinson" in All Categories

Wilmet Forsyth is well dressed, well looked after, suitably husbanded, good looking, and fairly young - but very bored. Her husband Rodney, a handsome army major, is slightly balder and fatter than he once was. Wilmet would like to think she has changed rather less. Her interest wanders to the nearby Anglo-Catholic church, where at last she can neglect her comfortable household in the more serious-minded company of three unmarried priests and Piers Longridge, a man of a different character altogether.

Following adventures she would sooner forget in the newly renamed New York, Mercia Blakewood is hopeful that she has gained the leverage with the king she needs to reclaim her family's home back in England. The breathtaking new world piques her curiosity, and a burgeoning friendship with Clemency Carter, a local medicine woman, prompts Mercia to delay her return.

Middle-aged artist-come-investigator Libby Sarjeant can't ever seem to have a quiet moment. Her son, Adam, has uncovered a body within Creekmarsh Place, where he is working as a gardener for TV personality Lewis Osbourne-Walker. The police seem to think there is no connection with the current owner, but Libby, naturally, can't just leave it at that. With her psychic friend Fran's mind on other things, Libby has to go it alone. A murder in London inspires the police to dig deeper, and Libby, determined to help her new friend Lewis, stirs up more trouble.

Ten years ago, a missing person story causes a furore in Kent - and the national media. A beautiful young woman with a promising career as a singer walks home alone from a party and is never seen again. There is no evidence, forensic or otherwise, and no-one is ever arrested. A decade later Libby Sarjeant is talked into inspecting a derelict hotel in her home village of Steeple Martin. The body of a young boy is discovered - but is it anything to do with the mysterious disappearance from more than 10 years ago?

It is early spring in 1944, and Allied troops will soon invade northern France. Alice Todd is beginning her second year as warden of a Land Army hostel located in the wilds of Devonshire. Here she has won the affection and confidence of the girls in her charge and found herself caught up in lives which are complex, humorous, and sometimes tragic.

October 1940. When VAD nurse Evie narrowly escapes being killed in an air raid during the London Blitz, it propels her to make a life-changing decision to break free of her troubled and unhappy life. She escapes to the Norfolk countryside to start afresh, with a job at the newly opened Great Plumstead Hall hospital, and a wonderful new home at Rookery House. The community of Great Plumstead welcomes evacuees to the village—mothers and children bombed out of their London homes. Sisters Prue and Thea, along with members of The Mother's Day Club, help the new arrivals settle in.

Ellie and her new husband Thomas are called to deal with Ursula, a young student who has staged a sit-in at church. Ursula challenges Ellie to solve three mysteries: a broken engagement, her friend Mia's disappearance, and a murder. As she investigates, Ellie begins to suspect that there is more to these events. Soon she finds her own friends and family targeted as a powerful group hunts her down.

A S Byatt's fairy tales and fables are among the best-loved features of her fiction. Innumerable listeners have asked for the two marvellous fairy tales in Possession - 'The Glass Coffin' and 'Gode's Tale' of the Breton Naie des Trepasses - to be published separately. Here they take their place with three other stories with medieval and oriental settings.

Bea Abbot's plans are disrupted by the unexpected arrival of one of her clients, bearing a brown leather briefcase full of expensive jewellery. Magda Summerleys has been working as a housekeeper for wealthy art expert Lucas Rycroft, who, she says, entrusted her with the briefcase for safekeeping - and who seems to have disappeared without trace.Drawn into the tangled affairs of the dysfunctional Rycrofts, Bea soon discovers that other members of the family are determined to get their hands on the jewels - by whatever means necessary.

Former cook Hettie Brown hears some shocking news, making her question her new life at Rookery House. Expectant mother, Gloria Jessop, is having doubts about her new evacuated life in the village. She's missing her family, and she's tempted to return to London. But is that the right thing to do? Hettie and Gloria decide to take action and quickly hatch a plan. Can they support each other, celebrate Christmas, and bring the whole village together in their time of need?

Amateur sleuth Libby Sarjeant and psychic investigator Fran find themselves in the middle of another investigation when a member of a local Morris Dancing side is unfortunately found dead on May Day. Driven in part by her interest in Morris lore and in part by her insatiable appetite for detecting, Libby leaves her comfort zone in Kent and travels to Cornwall. Here she sees the darker side of Morris and its surprising links to Satanism.

The 13th book in Lesley Cookman's best-selling Libby Sarjeant murder mystery series follows Libby and the gang as they visit the Isle of Wight for the funeral of an old friend. For once there is nothing suspicious about the death, but their invitation to the funeral comes from elderly cousins who do have an unexplained death in the family. As her best friend, Harry, seems to be involved somehow, Libby is determined to ignore the growing reluctance of the cousins to help as she investigates.

Armistice Day, London, 1918. Fiercely independent Georgie is tired of being told what's best for her by men. When she defies her father's wishes by going out into the peace festivities, she tries to help a woman being attacked and encounters Patrick, a gallant wounded ex-soldier looking for a new calling now that the fighting is done. But the war isn't over for everybody. Enemy forces have infiltrated the bureau and sent her father into hiding. And they are coming for her, too. Georgie knows there's only one place where she'll be safe: Honeyfield.

Libby Sarjeant is back. Libby Sarjeant returns to take on her latest case in the twenty-third gripping and twisting whodunit from Lesley Cookman. Perfect for fans of Faith Martin, J. R. Ellis and LJ Ross.

Nobody wants to be 'a nuisance to a killer', but is it too late? Psychic investigator Fran Castle gets a request from the police to help when a body discovered on a rocky island in the middle of Nethergate Bay thoroughly stumps them. Libby Sarjeant, Fran's sleuthing partner, is on the case too, refusing to abandon Fran to solve the case alone. Together they delve into the shameful world of the exploitation of illegal immigrants.

Slavers burst into Grace Winslow's life with guns blazing and tear her family apart forever. She watches in anguish as her husband is led in chains aboard a tightly packed slave ship bound for America. An old enemy has a more sinister plan for Grace and prepares her for a different kind of servitude in London. But Grace will not be enslaved. And she will not give up on the man she loves. In her determination to be reunited with her husband, she finds God reaching out to her.

From the summer of 1938, British women from all walks of life joined the Women's Voluntary Services (WVS). This disparate band of women came together for the common good - to help serve and protect their communities. By 1941 a million women had enrolled. These brave and dutiful women played a vital role in Britain's victory. The positive impact of the WVS on wartime society was universally acknowledged. They were instrumental in implementing the large-scale evacuation of children from bomb-targeted cities, in the care of the wounded, and in keeping those in war service fed.

A woman of independent means with a healthy dose of cynicism about the male persuasion, Harriet Tremayne is content with her circle of spinster friends and their devotion to literature, women's rights, and intellectual interests. However, when she determines to undertake a London Season for her beautiful but featherbrained niece, she concedes she must appear less a bluestocking and more fashionable to successfully sponsor this impossible young lady whose only real desire, it seems, is to consume chocolate.

In the last months of World War II, 10 Land Girls are serving at Post Stone Farm under the watchful eye of their warden, Alice Todd. The local Land Army representative had at first been reluctant to give Alice the warden’s job, and Roger Bayliss, the farm’s owner, seemed not to have any confidence in her at all. But she proved herself more than capable of the job and she has won the girls’ admiration. Recently divorced and with a 10 year-old son to bring up, Alice fears for the future.

Colin Hardcastle has arranged for two men to meet and discuss the sale of a house. But when Nick Nash - the owner of the property - doesn't show, Colin cannot begin to imagine the events he has set in motion. Perplexed, Colin tells his friends in Steeple Martin, piquing the interest of Libby Sarjeant - and the Reverend Patti Pearson, who finds Nash's name strangely familiar....