Showing results by narrator "Helen McAlpine" in All Categories

When city girl Shona moves with her partner Mikey and their baby to an idyllic cottage in rural Scotland, she believes that all that lies ahead for her family is happiness. But with Mikey working long hours away from home, the frightening isolation of the Scottish countryside begins to get to Shona. She feels lonely and trapped. That is, until she is rescued by a new friendship with the enchanting Valentina. Valentina enters Shona’s life like a whirlwind, bringing excitement and spontaneity to replace boredom and fear.

The groom’s grip is icy cold as he shakes my hand. “I have so wanted to meet you.” I look up into his steely eyes and a chill runs down my spine. I know this man, but no one can ever know why…

Commissar Cain is called to duty once more, saving a governor's daughter from a planet overrun by rebels. The uprising hides something far more sinister however - genestealer hybrids! The search for the source of the alien threat leads Cain to a drifting space hulk - a far safer place than beside the obsessed governor's daughter. But when the Reclamator Space Marines suffer devastating losses at the hands of the Great Devourer, Cain and his trusty aide Jurgen must go it alone.

Edinburgh, 1911: When Maud McIntyre and her lady’s maid, Daisy, form a detective agency, they never dream their first case will take place at a glamorous house in the Scottish Highlands. But when the duchess of Duddingston, concerned that a notorious jewelry thief will target her lavish weekend party, employs Maud to go undercover as a guest to find the culprit, the agency has its first case to solve....

In the shadowy closes of Edinburgh's Old Town, 16 people are murdered to feed surgeon Dr Robert Knox's insatiable need for his anatomy classes. Burke and Hare and their wives, Lucky and Nelly, are all complicit, but only Burke swings for their crimes. Lucky, Nelly and Hare go on the run from the angry mob, reinvention their only means of survival. Years later, journalist Duncan Fletcher hears rumours of sightings of the two women. Keen to impress his editor, Duncan investigates the aftermath of the murder trial.

When Maud and Daisy receive a letter from Daisy’s cousin, Clara, sharing her fears that two sudden deaths in her local choir weren’t accidental, at first Daisy thinks her cousin is overreacting. But Maud’s detective senses tell her something is afoot, and so they make haste to the Highlands to investigate.

When Maud McIntyre receives a letter from a maid called Rose, sharing her suspicions that something strange is happening in the house where she works, she and her assistant Daisy immediately travel to the Highlands to investigate.

1990: In a hot, humid Hong Kong summer, three young singers are loving life, performing to packed crowds every night in a swanky hotel bar. Twenty-three-year-old Scottish songbird, Moira Chiles is living the dream alongside Carina Lloyd and Lisa Dixon. They work hard, play hard, and always stick together… until one day Moira has to make a choice that changes everything.

This is... Denise. Married to Ray, her first and only love, Denise has never, for one moment, regretted putting the husband she idolised on a pedestal above everyone and everything else. But, after forty years of marriage, he is gone, leaving Denise to discover that their perfect marriage was fatally flawed. Now she faces a future alone. But first, she must face the betrayals of the past. This is... Claire. The estranged daughter of Denise, the woman who put her husband before her children, Claire took the opposite path and devoted her life to raising her family, sacrificing.

Their rise was meteoric. Only a few years before, they had been three friends from Glasgow, trying to survive in a world of danger and dysfunction. Suddenly they were thrust on to the world’s biggest stage, accepting an Oscar in front of the watching world. That night was the beginning of their careers. But it was the end of their friendships. For two decades they didn’t speak, driven apart by a horrific secret. Until now... Their past is coming back to bite them, and they have to decide whether to run, hide, or fight.

High Commander Farsight, fresh from his victory against the Imperium over the Damocles Gulf, looks to his borders and finds his old enemies—the savage and warlike orks—threatening to ravage the heart of the T’au Empire. Farsight’s obsessive crusade soon sees him locked in an escalating conflict with the greenskins, yet the hero of the Fire Caste will stop at nothing until their infestation is purged.

On Christmas Eve, 1968, Cathy McLean receives a surprise visit from the lost love of her life and is forced to choose between the one that got away and the one that stayed. On Christmas Eve, 1993, Cathy’s daughter Helena is overjoyed to hear that her boyfriend is about to propose, until a devastating encounter threatens to bring her heartbreak instead of diamonds. On Christmas Eve 2023, a shocking discovery rocks Eve Quinn’s world. The only gift Eve wants this year is the truth. But will it take a Christmas miracle to unravel generations of secrets?

Faced with the harsh reality that there are 25,000 more women than men in London, Katie’s dating prospects are at an all-time low. While she’s glad it’s not a man’s world anymore, it wouldn’t hurt if there were more eligible bachelors. More likely to get murdered than married, according to gleeful media reports, Katie resigns herself to the fact that there’s no sex in the city for her and decides to head for the hills - or the Scottish Highlands to be exact.

Phil Kelly continues his look at the life of Commander Farsight with his first campaign against the full might of the Imperium and shows how the T'au Empire's technological superiority fares against Imperial grit.

When 23-year-old shepherdess Emma Gray breaks off her engagement, the chance to take over an isolated Northumberland farm seems just the fresh start she needs. But while the beautiful scenery certainly offers plenty of scope for contemplation, a night out with an eligible bachelor soon seems more remote than the farm itself. And once you add fugitive sheep and freak blizzards into the mix, Emma's dreams of a happy future at Fallowlees Farm quickly begin to fade.

Commander O’Shaserra, better known as Shadowsun, is an ice-cold military genius celebrated across the Chalnath Expanse. She is the master of the stealth battlesuit assault and the Kauyon metastrategy – a philosophy of war that emulates the Patient Hunter. But how to lay a trap for the Chaos-worshipping warriors of the Death Guard, whose ancient technology allows their fleet to rip holes in space? And how to deal with their daemonic patrons, who defy the laws of physics and shatter the logical methods that Shadowsun holds so dear?

Scotland, 1912: When Maud and Daisy travel to Clachan Castle on the Isle of Mull to investigate the theft of a valuable statuette, at first the case seems straightforward. But when their prime suspect, bad-tempered fellow guest Mr Tremain, is found dead in his bed, the detective duo realise the castle is under attack… At first, it appears the murder is impossible. All the doors and windows to the room were locked from the inside, and there was no way for the killer to escape.

Opal is a gleaming shrine world of saints and soldiers, beloved of the Emperor Himself. Sent to retrieve the skull of the revered Saint Veres, Sister Superior Augusta of the Order of the Bloody Rose and her squad find themselves in the midst of the capital’s holiest festival, a time of reverence and celebration. But all is not well – despite what its planetary leaders would have Augusta believe, political danger bubbles under the surface, and rebel attacks gnaw away at the city’s outskirts. The greatest threat, however, is yet to come.

Carly Cooper is 30, single and after coming close to saying ‘I do’ to six different men, she’s wondering if she accidentally said ‘goodbye' to Mr Right. But there is a problem. Her ex-boyfriends are scattered all over the world and Carly lives in 1999: an era before Facebook, Google, smartphones, 4G and Broadband, when it was impossible to track people down with a few clicks of a mouse. On a mission to discover if she walked away from her 'happy ever after', Carly quits her job, her flat, her whole life and sets off on a quest to track down all the men she has ever loved.

Emma Gray was just 23 when she moved to an isolated farm in Northumberland, becoming Britain's youngest solo shepherdess. In the seasons that followed, Emma fell in love with its rolling fields, sycamore trees and sturdy farmhouse, where she tended her sheep and trained her dogs - and even found romance along the way. But when Emma finds herself suddenly alone again, heartbroken, mourning the loss of loved ones and recovering from a serious accident, she can't help but wonder if her isolated existence is still such a sensible idea.