The Other Son

Penny and Victoria are about as different as two siblings can be, one with a smart London lifestyle, the other struggling to make ends meet. But they are joined by more than blood, and their shared tragic past is affecting the present more than they realise. When events begin to tug at the fabric beneath which dark secrets are hidden, the resulting chaos threatens to tear the two families apart. Could there be aspects of the past that youngest child Penny doesn't remember? Could the truth of Marge be more complex than the beloved mother the girls choose to perceive?

Barbara - a child of the Blitz - has more secrets than she cares to admit. She has protected her children from the harsh realities of life and told them little of the poverty of her childhood, nor of the darker side of her marriage to one of Britain's most famous photographers. With such an incomplete picture, her youngest, Sophie, has struggled to understand who her parents really are, and in turn, Barbara sometimes worries, to build her own identity.

When Catherine learns that she is dying, she remembers the words her husband once jokingly uttered and decides to leave him the ultimate posthumous gift: a time capsule containing photographs of their life together along with tape recordings in which she recounts every secret she ever kept, every unspoken thought whether loving or treacherous - the things they never said.

Naomi and I are best friends. School runs, dog walks, a shoulder to cry on over a glass of wine - we’re inseparable. But now my husband has walked out, I need her more than ever. I know she will help me pick up the pieces. Because she knows about the lie I told to protect her. She knows how much I’ve sacrificed for this friendship. And she’d never let anyone hurt me. Would she?

In 1988 two girls with identical names and the same love of ballet meet for the first time. They seem destined to be best friends forever and to become professional dancers. Years later, however, they have both been dealt so many cruel and unexpected blows that they walk away from each other into very different futures - one enters a convent, the other becomes a minor celebrity. Will these new 'invisible' lives be the ones they were meant to live, or will they find that kind of salvation only when they are reunited 20 years later?

Little India, East London: Shyama, aged forty-four, has fallen for a younger man. They want a child together. Meanwhile, in a rural village in India, young Mala, trapped in an oppressive marriage, dreams of escape. When Shyama and Mala meet, they help each other realise their dreams. But will fate guarantee them both happiness? Brimming with warmth, wit and indignation, Meera Syal immerses us in a devastating story of friendship, family and the lengths a woman will go to have a child.

The four Bliss siblings have a loving but complicated bond, but when their mother, Dorothy, dies seemingly without a will, this relationship is put to the test. As the mourning siblings try to make sense of the situation, one of them is caught with a secret: before she died, Dorothy entrusted her favourite daughter with her will and a letter - and told her to destroy them both. But what Anna finds in the documents could change everything. Do the other siblings not deserve to know what it is about them that their mother was so desperate to hide?

When Frankie stumbles upon an unopened letter from her late mother, she’s delighted to have one last message from her...until she reads the contents and discovers the truth about her birth. Brimming with questions, she travels to York to seek further answers from the Mortimer family, but her appearance sends shock waves through them all. Meanwhile, Robyn Mortimer has problems of her own. Her husband, John, has become distant, and a chance remark from a friend leads Robyn to wonder exactly what he’s not been saying. Dare she find out more? 

On a leafy suburban street in Dublin, beautiful, poised Stella Greene lives with her successful husband, Matt. They're the perfect couple in every way, and Stella appears to have it all. Next door, at number 72, however, lives Rea Brady. Gruff, bad tempered and rarely seen besides the twitching of her net curtains, rumour has it she's lost it all...including her marbles, if you believe the neighbourhood gossip. But appearances can be deceiving, and when Stella and Rea's worlds collide they realise they have much in common.

Haunted by a past she can't escape, Laura Cunningham desires nothing more than to keep her world small and precise - her quiet relationship and growing jewellery business are all she needs to get by. Until the day when Rob Blake walks into her studio and commissions a necklace that will tell his enigmatic wife Cat's life in charms.

Mel Taylor was thirteen years old when she found her Mr Right. Twenty years on they remain blissfully in love. She has the man she adores, a gorgeous daughter, a great job and a dream home. But Mel's seemingly perfect life is spoilt by a dark secret and a niggling fear that her good fortune can't last for ever. Despite her husband Adam telling her to live for the present and stop worrying about the future, Mel can't shake the feeling that someone is about to call time on their happiness. And then it happens.

Carrie is a successful TV producer in a high pressure job. She’s talented, liked, and well-respected. She and her husband, Adrian, an award-winning screenwriter, decided years before that they didn’t want children. But now, just as they’re both at the pinnacle of their careers, she has discovered she is pregnant and is shocked to find that she wants to keep the baby. But in a competitive industry where time off is seen as a sign of weakness, Carrie looks on the prospect of maternity leave with trepidation. Enter Emma, the temp, who is everything she could wish for as her cover: smart, willing and charming. 

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Vince and Joy by Lisa Jewell. July 1986. Vince and Joy have their whole lives ahead of them on the day they meet. Two weeks later they must part, each having lost a piece of their heart to the other. They won't see one another for seven years. Where will they be then? And in the years that follow? What will become of Vince and Joy?

There’s a moment, when you meet someone new, when the connection is so strong that making a friend can feel like falling in love. That’s how it was for Connie and Ness. They met in the park while their children played, and as they talked, they realised they were neighbours. Perhaps it was only natural that they and their families would become entirely inseparable. But when Ness’ marriage ends in a bitter divorce, she is suddenly at Connie’s house all the time. Connie doesn’t have a moment to herself, no time alone with her husband, not a second to chat to her kids.

Susie did something that she knows she will always regret: giving her baby son up for adoption, to keep her infidelity secret from her family. Louise, Susie's daughter, feels the effects of that decision echoing down through the years - her mother has always been difficult, too strict with her but not strict enough with her sister, Grace, who is wild and out of control. And Danny, Susie's husband, adores her but has always sensed something wrong at the heart of their marriage.