The Cobbler's Wife

The new novel from the Sunday Times best-selling author. The perfect heartwarming romance for Christmas. 

One wild night in the 1930s, midwife Patty Peel is called to attend a birth on the opposite side of Liverpool. She pedals off into the storm and delivers a baby girl in a filthy slum dwelling, just as the mother dies. The drunk and violent father tells Patty to get rid of it so she takes the child away, meaning to deliver it to the nearest orphanage. However, Patty spent her entire childhood in an institution, except for the frequent occasions when she ran away, and cannot bear to hand the baby over. 

Calico Road runs through a tiny Lancashire hamlet up on the edge of the moors, miles from anywhere. Its folk are an independent breed - and in 1827 they are a thorn in the side of the vicious mill owner in the valley below. Toby Fletcher's father ignored his bastard son while alive. Now Toby is the new owner of the rambling old inn, an unwitting keeper of its secrets. Then Meg Staley comes to Calico - a woman who was strong enough to survive one tragedy but found it harder to withstand a second blow. 

London, 1875. Taking one last look around her little room in Covent Garden, Nettie Carroll couldn’t believe she wouldn’t even be able to say good-bye to her friends. Her father had trusted the wrong man, and now they would have to go on the run. Once again.

Emmy Carter's mother is a prostitute - and her life has made Emmy determined to avoid the same fate. But Emmy is beautiful, so attracts unwanted attention; her mother's protector has his eye on her, as does evil Marcus Armistead, her employer's nephew. Marcus is excited by Emmy's virginity and has her kidnapped, but Emmy hits him over the head and escapes. Marcus, further enraged, kills her mother and becomes even more determined to rape Emmy, but the combined efforts of the local parson and Emmy's young suitor manage to keep her safe from harm. 

The Pratchett family have to contend with coalman Alfie Pratchett's obsessive jealousy. A bully, his two teenage children, John and Millie, have learned to dodge him and his moods. The main concern of ugly duckling Millie - who looks nothing like her handsome brother John - is to protect their mum, Eileen. When crisis strikes the Pratchetts' home, Alfie is forced to watch his whole world gradually collapse around him. Their old life has gone forever, and a new one has begun - one in which rape, debt, alcoholism and insanity play their parts. And redemption is a long time coming.

London, 1935. Ruby is always hungry, but she will go without if it means her young brothers can eat. 1930s Bermondsey might be called the larder of London, with its pie, pickle and jam factories, but for the poor working classes, starvation is often only a heartbeat away. When Ruby's neighbour suggests she ought to go to the Methodist Mission for free food, Ruby knows her father will be furious, but she has no other option.

Orpha Buchanan and Peg Meriweather had a very different start in life. Orpha surrounded by wealth and riches, Peg dumped on a doorstep as a baby with nothing to her name. But one thing they had in common was a mother who despised them and wished them gone. Hortense Buchanan wasn't made to be a mother. Bullied herself when she was a child, she continues the tradition with her own children. When her daughter, Orpha, runs away from home, Hortense celebrates, never once worrying for her safety.

Germany 1939, and Christa Sommer boards the Kindertransport, unsure that she'll ever see her beloved mother and father again. Once in England she is taken in by elderly Mrs Pelling, who grows to love Christa as the daughter she never had. But in 1945 Mrs Pelling dies. While her will cannot be found, her money-grabbing niece appears out of the blue to claim her inheritance and turfs Christa out, with only a suitcase to her name. The prejudice against Germans still runs high in England, and Christa is unable to secure a job or a place to stay.

It is a cold December night and Sylvie Dugdale is weeping as she walks by the Mersey. She fails to notice an approaching figure, and jumping to one side to avoid collision, she finds herself struggling in the ice-cold river. Constable Brendan O'Hara, just coming off duty, sees the girl's plight and dives in to rescue her. He is dazzled by her beauty but discovers that Sylvie's husband is in prison, and the closeness that Brendan soon longs for is impossible. But he is able to help her escape from Liverpool....

'She's not worth more than tuppence, that child!' Those are the words that haunt Sadie Linthorpe. She is the talk of Ryhope when she arrives there, aged 17, alone, seeking work and a home in the pit village. But Sadie is keeping a secret - that she is searching for her baby girl who was taken from her at birth to be sold by the child's wicked, battleaxe grandmother when Sadie was just 15 years old.   

1912, London. Eighteen-year-old Flora Butler is going up in the world. She has the prized position of lady's maid to young Constance Ogilvie and is able to provide for her beloved parents and four younger siblings. She has even fallen in love, and though she does not feel quite ready to marry, her future seems clear. But Flora's life is turned upside down when her mistress' father dies. Connie is forced to move to New York to live with her aunt until she comes of age and begs Flora to go with her. Flora has never left the country before and now faces a difficult decision.

When Jenny’s mother abandons her and her younger siblings, Jenny is left at the mercy of her abusive father, Henry. And when Henry beats his eldest daughter so badly that she ends up in the hospital, it seems like there’s nowhere left for them all to go. But factory worker Craig has fallen head over heels for Jenny, and he offers her a place to stay. Happy at last, Jenny begins a new life with him, but when tragedy strikes, she’s left to pick up the pieces of both her broken home – and her broken heart. 

After her mother's death, 20-year-old Sophie Ross is left orphaned, with only her erstwhile nursemaid and faithful friend, Hannah, for company. Penniless and with little chance of an income, she looks for work as a governess in London to avoid destitution. But unbeknownst to Sophie, her mother instructed Hannah to post a letter to Trescadinnick House in Cornwall upon her death. The letter will be the catalyst that changes Sophie's life forever as she learns of her mother's doomed romance and family she left behind in Cornwall.  

Daisy Bacon has an ordinary, happy life living with her family in South London, until tragedy strikes and her mother is killed in a devastating accident. Blaming herself, Daisy retreats into a world of silence, unable to utter a word. When her father remarries, the family home becomes unbearable at the mercy of cruel stepmother Vera. Luckily, Daisy can always count on her cousin Lizzie to bring sunshine to her life. But when shocking truths about Vera come to light, could it bring the possibility of a fresh start for Daisy after all?