Showing results by narrator "Sarah Barron" in All Categories

Ruby's singing career is on the verge of hitting the big time when her voice breaks. Fearing her career is over, she signs up for a retreat in Tenerife to recover. But an unexpected call from a stranger on a remote Scottish island takes her on a short trip to sort out some family business. It's time to go and see the grandfather she's never met. City girl Ruby knows she will be happy to leave the windswept beaches behind as quickly as she can, especially as a years-old family rift means she knows she won't be welcome at Teach Mhor.  

For generations, the Alardyce family have lived under the shadow of a curse. Some say it died with Robert Alardyce - the ruthless patriarch whose name was whispered in fear - but others know darkness like his never truly fades. Decades later, Alardyce House stands empty, its secrets lost behind its walls. Until Kate Alardyce - Robert's sharp and ambitious great-granddaughter - decides it's time to reclaim her family's legacy. And Kate always gets what she wants...

Pippa has long felt like the odd one out in her family. Natalia has recently returned to Lerwick, hoping to reconnect with an old flame. Autumn is dedicated to her job in hospitality and relishes her role as general manager of Lerwick Manor's new hotel. No guest request is too big or too small, but her own unrelentingly high standards could push Autumn to her limits. Will the beauty of Shetland help these three women find the friendship, support and healing that they all need?

When Jemima loses her beloved grandfather, keeping his allotment alive seems like ideal way to feel close to him. She's never fitted in before - is this her chance to find where she really belongs? Finally Melissa has the allotment she's been longing for to distract her while her husband works away - even if it is chest-high in weeds. But when she looks for help in the wrong place, she finds she's the hottest topic of gossip.

When Amy Osbourne’s parents are lost at sea, she is forced to leave her London home and is sent to live with her aunt and uncle at the opposite end of the country. Alardyce House is depressing and dreary, her aunt haughty and cruel. Amy strikes up a friendship with her cousin Edward but his older brother Henry is just as conceited as his mother, and a mutual loathing develops between him and Amy. Struggling in this strange, unwelcoming environment, Amy begins to suspect that something isn’t right at Alardyce House.

Edinburgh 1896. At Alardyce House, the family are gathered to celebrate the engagement of the heir to the estate, Robert, to his childhood sweetheart. But what should be a precious memory for his mother Amy, is marred by darkness. For Robert’s biological father was a demon and a criminal, and now Robert is coming-of-age, disturbing reports are beginning to emerge about his behaviour. Amy is torn between her love and loyalty to her son, her hope that she can save his soul, and her growing sense of dread that the streets of Edinburgh aren’t safe when Robert is in town.

The brilliant new novel from award-winning writer and rising star Claire Askew. DI Helen Birch is recovering from major surgery, housebound and exceptionally bored. Her boss, DCI McLeod, has made it crystal clear: she is not to take on any work until her recuperation is over. In her absence, Amy...

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ‘A romance like no other . . . this book has it all’ NetGalley Reviewer ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ‘A brilliant read and a perfect ending . . . best read of the year’ NetGalley Reviewer The brand new seasonal novel from the author of the bestselling book, A Secret Scottish Escape...

A fist-fight by an open grave leads Dorothy to investigate the possibility of a faked death, while a young woman's obsession with Hannah threatens her relationship with Indy and puts them both in mortal danger. An elderly man claims he's being abused by the ghost of his late wife, while ghosts of another kind come back to haunt Jenny from the grave...pushing her to breaking point. As the Skelfs struggle with increasingly unnerving cases and chilling danger lurks close to home, it becomes clear that grief, in all its forms, can be deadly.

Something scared Nuala Flaherty to death. When her body is found in the centre of a pentagram on a lonely moor, Rebecca is determined to find out what. Was she killed by supernatural means, or is there a more down-to-earth explanation? Rebecca's investigation leads her to a mysterious cult and local drug dealings. But what she doesn't know is that crime matriarch Mo Burke still has her in her crosshairs. Mo wants payback for the death of her son, and after one failed attempt to hurt Rebecca, she is upping the ante. And this time, it could be lethal.

In the dead of night someone starts a fire in a home for underprivileged children in Aberdeen. The flames spread quickly, and one person doesn't make it out alive. But the victim wasn't found in their bedroom; they were discovered locked inside a secret basement underground. As DI Eve Hunter and her team search the blackened ruins, the case takes them into even darker territory. Soon Eve unearths a horrific discovery at the heart of the property - one that turns the whole investigation on its head. Everyone in this home has something to hide, but who has a secret worth killing for?

Robertson Bennet returns to Edinburgh after a 25-year absence in search of his parents and his inheritance. But both have disappeared. A quick, routine police check should be enough - and Detective Inspector Helen Birch has enough on her plate trying to help her brother, Charlie, after an assault in prison. But all her instincts tell her not to let this case go. And so she digs. George and Phamie Bennet were together for a long time. No one can ever really know the secrets kept between husband and wife.

1927. Flight fever is running rampant and daring flyers are all anyone can talk about. And now the Honourable Miss Elsie Mackay, glamorous former film star and regular name in gossip columns, has a new ambition - to be the first woman to fly the Atlantic. Stella Campbell was once at the heart of world events. Working at the Paris Peace Conference, she helped forge peace across Europe. Now a decade on, post-war hopes are frayed, and marriage and motherhood have worn away Stella's sense of self until she's not sure what remains.

Clova, Scotland, 1942. The midst of the Second World War. Sisters Nell and Effie Anderson live together in the Old Schoolhouse. Effie is a teacher, while Nell works as a postwoman, delivering news – often of the worst – from the frontline to her neighbours. Though they love and care for one another, there are unspoken tensions and mysteries that put distance between them.

‘A warm, romantic mystery, beautifully structured and feelingly written’ Daily Mail? At the heart of a tiny community in a remote village just inland from the Aberdeenshire coast stands an unexpected lighthouse… Built two centuries ago by an eccentric landowner, the lighthouse has become...

Audrey Hart is on the Isle of Skye to collect the word-of-mouth folk tales of the people and communities around her. It is 1857, the Highland Clearances have left devastation and poverty, and the crofters are suspicious and hostile, claiming they no longer know their stories. Then Audrey discovers the body of a young girl washed up on the beach, and the crofters tell her that it is only a matter of weeks since another girl has disappeared. They believe the girls are the victims of the spirits of the unforgiven dead. 

Amy Alardyce's once-perfect life is in tatters. Her eldest son, Robert, has come of age, become the master of his own home, and married his childhood love Jane. But with maturity has come a terrible legacy, and the dark desires Robert inherited from his evil father Matthew, are fighting to get loose. Whilst Jane is working hard to get her and Robert accepted into fashionable society, poor women are being hunted on the streets of Edinburgh, and Amy fears her son is to blame.

Two orphaned girls become found family amidst the horrors of WWII in a gripping and heart-wrenching tale of friendship, loss and survival against the odds which sweeps the listener across wartime Europe to Budapest from the mountains of Scotland.

A practical call to arms that challenges the persistent inequality of power between men and women. Why is gender inequality so stubbornly persistent? Power. Even today, power remains concentrated in the hands of men right across the worlds of business, politics and culture. Decisions taken by those with power tend to perpetuate gender inequality rather than accelerate solutions. And those who see the problem often feel powerless: ingrained sexism and gender inequality can seem too huge to solve. Equal Power holds a mirror up to society, showing the stark extent of gender inequality.

Love is not a singular concept. In this collection, seven award-winning authors explore seven concepts of love: from philautia (self-love) to agape (love for humanity) and from storge (a natural affection for family) to mania (a frenzied, obsessive love).