Queenie Sagas

Queenie Kenney seems born to suffer. Her mum dies giving birth to her, her drunken father George ignores her unless he is cursing her, and only her beloved Auntie Biddy provides an anchor for the little girl. And after her aunt dies, there is no one to protect Queenie from her father, who blames his daughter for her mother’s death. But in spite of hardship, Queenie grows tall and strikingly beautiful with her deep grey eyes and her abundant honey-coloured hair. Love, in the shape of Rick Marsden, might release her from the burden of the drink-sodden George.

Queenie Bedford fled her native Blackburn and the bitter knowledge that she and Rick Marsden, the man she loved, could never marry. But in 1965, she returns north again to stand by her friend Sheila Thorogood, imprisoned for running a brothel with her mother Maisie. Though Rick had vowed to find her, Queenie takes care that he should not know of her whereabouts. The magnificent Edwardian house in Blackpool is sadly neglected – but Queenie moves in with the ailing Maisie, and sets about transforming it into a sparklingly clean, highly respectable guesthouse.