Showing results by publisher "Isis Publishing Ltd" in Historical Fiction

Roddy Greenbank was brought by his father to the remote Northumberland community of Langley in the autumn of 1807. Within hours of their arrival, however, the father meets a violent death and the boy is left with all memory of his past life gone. Adopted and raised by old Kate Makepeace, Roddy found his closest companions in Hal Roystan and Mary Ellen Lee. These three stand at the heart of a richly eventful narrative that spans the first half of the 19th century, their lives lastingly intertwined by the inexorable demands of a strange and somewhat cruel destiny.

Her name was Hannah Boyle, but to the people of the village she would always be 'The Girl' - Matthew Thornton's bastard. Savagely treated by Matthew's wife, Anne, she fled for protection to the devil-may-care horse-dealer, Ned Ridley, who had earlier befriended her. But, as the waif grew to beautiful womanhood, she became an object of desire to the local young men, and even to her half-brother. Against her wishes, she was married off, but Hannah kept on fighting for the man she wanted: Ned Ridley, who adored her and taught her the meaning of true love and passion.

After the devastating loss of her beloved brother, young Katharine Hepburn makes two vows: she will become famous, and she will never let anyone hurt her again. Leaving behind her East Coast marriage and icy patrician family, she arrives in 1930s Hollywood – accompanied by her lover and determined to live on her own terms. But the studio system has rules. And Kate – brilliant, bisexual, and fiercely independent – refuses to follow them.

The pampered daughter of a wealthy Georgian plantation owner, sixteen-year-old Scarlett O’Hara soon realises that young men can’t resist her charms, despite her forthright manners and her refusal to embrace her mother’s ladylike ways. She enters into an early marriage, but when the war between the Union and the Southern States breaks out and she is left a young widow, Scarlett’s life is turned upside down, and she finds herself embroiled, together with the world surrounding her, in a long struggle for survival.

Dallas, November 2, 1963. Wayne Tedrow, Jr., has arrived to kill a man. The fee is $6,000. He finds himself instead in the middle of a cover-up following JFK’s assassination. There follows a hellish five-year ride through the sordid underbelly of public policy via Las Vegas, Howard Hughes, Vietnam, CIA dope dealing, Cuba, sleazy showbiz, racism and the Klan. This is the 1960s under Ellroy’s blistering lens, the icons of the era mingled with cops, killers, hoods and provocateurs.

It's 1958. America is about to emerge into a bright new age - an age that will last until the 1,000 days of John F. Kennedy’s presidency. Three men move beneath the glossy surface of power, men allied to the makers and shakers of the era. Peter Bondurant, Howard Hughes’ right-hand man, Jimmy Hoffa’s hit man. Kemper Boyd, employed by J. Edgar Hoover to infiltrate the Kennedy clan. Ward Littell, a man seeking redemption in Bobby Kennedy’s drive against organised crime.

Coming up 16, Tilly Trotter is different from the other girls. Tall for her age and coltish, she is not afraid of taking on 'man’s work' to help out the grandparents who raised her in a cottage at the edge of the Sopwith Estate. Testing times lay ahead for Tilly, often hard to endure and even bringing her the undeserved taint of being suspected of witchcraft. She only loves one man, farmer Simon Bentwood, and is heartbroken to discover he is betrothed to another. A spurned suitor takes a terrible revenge, and a betrayal forces her into the cruel drudgery of the local mine.

May 1939. When Amy Rowlings and Inspector Bodkin are invited to a black-tie civic awards ceremony at the Town Hall, they expect to be met with the usual boring speeches and toe-curling sycophancy, but when the recipient of the night's 'Businessman Of The Year Award', Nelson Kelly, is found stabbed to death after being called from the stage to answer the telephone, the evening begins to liven up. Nelson's company has just won a lucrative contract to build a new armaments factory and many of the town's elite, having backed a rival bidder, aren't happy at missing out.

Sep McGilby always said that Emily Kennedy had a happy face. And at 16, Emily had a lot to be glad about. She loved working as maid-of-all-work for the McGilbys, the only cloud on her horizon was her anxiety about her delicate younger sister, Lucy. But when Mrs McGilby dies, and Sep is killed in an accident soon after, Emily and Lucy must leave South Shields to look for work, which they find at Croft Dene House.

Alastair Cunningham wakes up in hospital with almost total amnesia. But he knows that something terrible happened in his past, something that haunts him still. A young family friend, Clemence, is called in to help rekindle his memory. Retreating with Alastair to his remote cottage, Clemence finds a peculiar manuscript hidden away from prying eyes. Reading the prologue, she discovers a murder by someone very much like a young Alastair. The victim? Clemence's grandmother, Sophie.

Life on the Fifteen Streets was a continual struggle for survival. John O'Brien grew up in abject poverty, confined to the hardships of the Fifteen Streets. Labouring on the city's docks and trying to keep his loved ones safe from the drunken wrath of his father and brother, this is the only way of life he knows. Then John O'Brien meets his sister's teacher.

The death of The Conqueror left three sons to inherit his power and his wealth. Normandy for Robert, England for Rufus, and for Henry, the youngest, 5,000 pounds of silver. The three were natural rivals. The feckless Robert lost his Norman dukedom in an orgy of impulsive extravagance. Red-haired Rufus scandalized the court with his perverse sexuality and contempt for the Church. And Henry - cleverest of all - awaited his chance to fulfill his father’s prophecy and assume the mantle of The Lion of Justice.

Bridget Kittrick, headstrong and independent, is ready to show her worth when she's left in charge of her family's estate. She meets Lincoln Huntley, a man with a mysterious past which only heightens her attraction to him. A vicious neighbour, Mr Roache, holds a grudge against the family and orchestrates for Bridget to be kidnapped by wanted men, bushrangers, who take her deep into mountainous country to a hideout. The Boss, Donovan, is unlike any other man Bridget has known and he soon shows her a side to him that pulls at her heart.

When the distressing shadows of war fall across Europe, Olivia Brodie watches the man she loves, Captain Spencer Middleton, lead his men proudly to the front, his final words a promise to return. Left behind among the working-class neighbours she calls family, Olivia clings to hope as the world around her changes forever. Her spirited younger brother, Lachie, eager to prove himself, enlists underage – his letters home filled with bravado and dreams of glory.

A neo-noir crime novel from the legendary crime novelist James Ellroy. Los Angeles, 15th January 1947: a beautiful young woman walked into the night and met her horrific destiny. Five days later, her tortured body was found drained of blood and cut in half. The newspapers called her 'The Black Dahlia'. Two cops are caught up in the investigation and embark on a hellish journey that takes them to the core of the dead girl's twisted life....

'You don’t mean you're going to divorce him?' Miss Spanner said with horror. A sophisticated, emotive novel, Chatterton Square concerns the complex web of relationships between two neighbouring families, the Blacketts and the Frasers. Framed by the advance of the Second World War, the subtle mechanics of marriage and love are laid bare through the observation of three of the marital options open to the mid-century woman: unmarried, separated, miserably married.

AD 1209: When a robbery in Sherwood goes wrong, Robin Hood, Sir Alan Dale and a handful of their outlaw friends are forced to flee their homes to escape the wrath of a vengeful King John and his iron-hearted Sheriff of Nottinghamshire. After travelling to the Languedoc, a land of good food, fine wine, elegant love poetry and religious tolerance, the Sherwood men find themselves caught up in a blood-soaked crusade launched by Pope Innocent III.

Former chief investigator Jan Kalisz lives a dangerous double life, forced to work with the occupiers as he gathers information for the fledgling Polish resistance. Even his family cannot be told his true allegiance. When the niece of a Wehrmacht general is found terribly mutilated, Jan links the murder to other killings that are of less interest to his new overlords. Soon, he finds himself on the trail of a psychopathic killer known as The Artist. But, shunned as a Nazi collaborator, can he solve the case before another innocent girl is taken?

Mona has almost everything: money, friends, social status...everything except for freedom. Languishing in her golden cage, she craves a sense of belonging. Desperate for emotional release, she turns to a friend who introduces her to a world of glitter, glamour, covert affairs and drugs. There she meets Ali, a physically and emotionally wounded man, years younger than her.

A startling panorama of Los Angeles in the '50s. New Year's Eve as 1949 turns to 1950, Los Angeles: The City of Angels has becomes the city of the Angel of Death. Communist witch hunts and insanely violent killings are terrorising the community. Three men are plunged into a maelstrom of violence and deceit when their lives become inextricably linked as each one confronts his own personal darkness.