Showing results by narrator "Katy Sobey" in All Categories

When Grace and Lola meet for the first time, it's at a home for young unmarried mothers. Consumed by the dark secrets that brought them there, the two forge an unlikely friendship. When the time comes, Grace is forced to give her daughter away, while Lola's parents take her son in to raise as their own. Seeking refuge after running away from home, Grace finds safety in Lola's family.

After her husband Jack is transported to Australia as a convict, Hannah and her children are sent to the workhouse. Hearing nothing from Jack and believing he's dead, Hannah reluctantly agrees to marry widower Ellis Duxbury. But her children must remain in the workhouse, and when they are sent away as apprentices, it's up to Hannah to track them down. On Christmas Eve, Hannah is blessed with a miracle when Jack returns to the village. Yet more trouble lies ahead as Hannah is arrested, accused of bigamy and threatened with deportation herself.

The eldest of three children, Kate helps her mother run the Devlin plait-school. They supply the material for the famous Luton Straw Boater. Kate longs to leave this life behind and become a hat-maker. Then a family tragedy changes everything. And Joseph Devlin, Kate's estranged uncle, turns up on their doorstep. He warns Kate that the worst is yet to come. Kate loses her home and her work. Things are looking very bleak, until Daniel Groves, the new owner of Heaven Scent lavender farm takes a liking to Kate.

When the parish guardians send Lydia, daughter of convict James Knowles, to apprentice in the cotton mill at Caton, she is distraught at being parted from her younger siblings and mother, Betty, but she has no choice. At the mill, Lydia is bullied by some of the other girls and things do not go well when she stands up to the ringleader. Fearing she has killed someone and with the word murderess ringing in her ears, Lydia runs for her life.

This is the story of Ophelia Jane Worthington-Whittard, who doesn't believe in anything. She is still grieving for her dead mother when her father takes a job in a museum, in a city where it always snows. On her first day in the museum, Ophelia discovers a boy locked away in a long-forgotten room. He is a prisoner of Her Majesty the Snow Queen, and he has been waiting for Ophelia's help..

When Fern and Paul move into the large old house on Crenellation Lane, with beautiful high ceilings and a luscious garden, they think they’ve found their dream home. After the devastating loss of Fern’s twin sister, it will be a fresh start and somewhere to raise their first baby. But as soon as they arrive, Fern starts having terrifying nightmares about the woman who lived there before. When the woman showed Fern around, they bonded over their pregnancies. Now, Fern can’t let her go. Paul fears his wife has relapsed, obsessing in the same way she did after her twin’s death.

A shared story can last forever. Hannah's grandad loves telling stories from his past, but there's one that he can't remember…one that Hannah knows is important. When a whale appears off the coast, clues to Grandad's secret begin to surface. Hannah is determined to solve the mystery but, as she gets closer to the truth, Grandad's story is more extraordinary than she imagined.

Some friendships are meant to be.... A story about family, friendship, and belonging from best-selling author Sarah Lean. Hope lives with her artist mum in the Pyrenees. It's always been just the two of them...until Frank - a free-spirited traveller - arrives with his donkey, Harry. Hope and Frank form a close bond, so it's hard for both of them when Frank decides it's time to move on. Hope questions what she is to Frank. He's not her dad, but he was more than just her mum's boyfriend. Except there's no name for that kind of pair.... Hope promises to look after Harry ,and slowly another special pair is made - one that makes Hope realise that some friendships become part of you, and even when someone is far away they are always near to your heart.

London, 1321: In a small shop in Paternoster Row, three people are drawn together around the creation of a magnificent book, an illuminated manuscript of prayers, a book of hours. Even though the commission seems to answer the aspirations of each one of them, their own desires and ambitions threaten its completion. As each struggles to see the book come into being, it will change everything they have understood about their place in the world. In many ways, this is a story about power—it is also a novel about the place of women in the roiling and turbulent world of the early fourteenth century.

A heartwarming novel from the queen of family saga and author of Bicycles and Blackberries, Sheila Newberry. Suffolk, 1925. At only 16 years old, May Moon travels to West Wick, Suffolk, to become the local Punch and Judy girl. Determined to fulfil her dead father's wishes and to continue his business, May has her work cut out for her during her summer on the beach. Staying with a local family, she not only enjoys the silvery sand and sunshine; she also experiences first love, partings and reunions.

Ever since Alice was adopted, everything has been perfect, but when she finds out her Mum is going to have a baby, Alice's world turns upside down. Alice doesn't speak at all. She stays silent until six months have passed.... Zack has everything. His dad's a stuntman, and he’s popular at school. Everything's perfect. Until Zack's dad is killed on set, and his mum is forced to move. Then he meets Alice, the girl who doesn't speak....

When Sophia first meets Hollywood actor and Ivy College teacher, Marc Blackwell, she never dreams they'll share a forbidden, obsessive relationship. Now, dawn is breaking and they've decided to tell the world of their affair. But as paparazzi hound Sophia's every move, Marc steps up his control - dominating Sophia in every way possible, and drawing her into his dark world of intensity and passion.

The sky is cornflower blue, the air is scented with the smell of fresh apple blossom and Lizzie Lovell can’t wait to start her new life in the mill on Magnolia Lane. But is she just about to fall in love with someone she shouldn’t? When Lizzie loses her larger-than-life dad she doesn’t know how to move forward. Encouraged by a childhood dream she shared with her beloved father, she is determined to continue his legacy and moves to the old Mill on Magnolia Lane, a place he had always longed to own.

Four people walked into the dining room that night. One would never leave. Matthew: the perfect husband. Titus: the perfect son. Charlie: the perfect illusion. Rachel: the perfect stranger. Charlie didn’t want her at the book club. Matthew wouldn’t listen. And that’s how Charlie finds himself slumped beside his husband’s body, their son sitting silently at the dinner table, while Rachel calls 999, the bloody knife still gripped in her hand.

Murder is in the air when hedge-jumping champ Dave Randall accuses his archenemy, Jack Webster, of sabotaging his dream to compete at the upcoming European Games. Vicky is used to Dave's histrionics and she turns a blind eye. After all, she has bigger fish to fry - namely, solving the mysterious death of worm-charming diva Ruth Reeves, whose sudden inheritance has made her very unpopular with old friends and neighbours alike.

Gabriela is a senior negotiator in the Foreign Office. When she returns to her young family after a seven-month stint in Moscow, something doesn’t seem right. Isobel is a journalist on the local paper in Camden. After witnessing a violent attack, she starts to investigate. But someone saw her watching, and is making themselves known in increasingly frightening ways. As Gabriela’s life begins to unravel, Isobel gets closer to the truth, and the two women’s lives converge in this deeply chilling examination of deceit.

We know that's what modern mums want: that's why so many of them have joined Mush, our app, to chat to other mums going through the same thing. We know that milestones aren't just about your baby smiling or walking or sleeping through the night for the first time but everything you're going through, too: the first time you manage to leave the house, the first time you get on a train (or plane) with your little one and the first time you have sex with your partner again. The 'mumsition' is the biggest thing you'll ever go through, and so, from the moment you go on maternity leave, we've got your back.

Ellie Taber's final year at university is hurtling to a close at alarming speed. Defeated by her philosophy dissertation and uncertain as to why she can't quite commit to her faultlessly supportive boyfriend, she is disenchanted with university life. Charlie, on the other hand, is determined to use his final year to become the man he was always meant to be. He plans to play the field, do just enough work to secure his degree, finally develop his brilliant business idea and basically have an awesome time. They are both in for a surprise.

When 15-year-old Becs meets Bracken, she is convinced she's found her soul mate. So what if he's much older? He understands her, she feels free with him and when he holds her she feels safe. But is she?Some young women in the area have been sexually assaulted. It's the talk of the school. And when Bec's best friend, Mary-Jane, becomes his latest victim, the true dangers hit home: just as Rebecca is starting to wonder about her future with Bracken, poor M-J rapidly shrinks away from life....

Devastated by the death of her husband, Annie Philips is shocked to discover she is pregnant with his unborn child. Hoping for a fresh start, she travels to a remote stone cottage in Anglesey, amidst the white-capped mountains of North Wales. She settles in quickly, helped by her mysterious new neighbour, Peter. But everything changes when Annie discovers a small wooden box, inlaid with brass and mother-of-pearl. A box she was never supposed to find.