Showing results by narrator "Kim Hicks"

Lady Audley is universally adored: Beautiful, kind and charming, she enamors all whom she meets. It is not until the strange disappearance of widower George Talboys that her behavior takes an odd turn. George's friend, Robert Audley, Lady Audley's nephew-in-law, is on the case; an upper-class layabout turned detective, he is determined to get to the bottom of things.

Lauren is adopted and keen to know more about her mysterious past. But when she discovers that she may have been snatched from an American family as a baby, her life suddenly feels like a sham. Why will no one answer her questions? How can she find her biological mum and dad? And are her adoptive parents really responsible for kidnapping her?

This work features Fran Varady, who is insolvent, unemployed, nearly homeless, but resolute. When the secret, selfish member of her squat dies, Fran finds herself thinking that all was not as it first seemed.

For many years Colette has avoided returning to her homeland - the magical island of Belle-Île-en-Mer in Southern Brittany - afraid to confront the painful memories she left behind. She is living on the Cornish coast when she hears about her mother Thea's failing health and realises that the time has come for her to go home. But can Colette ever forgive Thea for what she has done?

Fran Varady fell into private detective work by accident rather than design. Now she's got a 'real' job at a trendy pizzeria, she's back on track with her acting ambitions and she's even found a nice flat to rent. But things aren't as straightforward as they seem. The job, for a start: there's something rather sinister about the way the pizzeria is run. And the play rehearsals aren't going well. As if all this doesn't bring problems enough, Fran has rashly undertaken to help a young boy, illegally in the country, find an elusive people trafficker called Max.

Eileen Wells' daughters mean the world to her, and her husband Reg is just as proud of his beautiful, confident girls. Twenty-two-year-old Ann has secured a position as a secretary, eighteen-year-old Lucy works in the same office as Ann, and sixteen-year-old Shirley enjoys her job at Woolworths. For three sisters, the family home in Rotherhithe is a place of stability and love. But when war is announced, Eileen knows everything is about to change...

Twelve years ago, Grace Kitto was a successful TV producer, wife and mother. She was also clinically obese and on the path to Type 2 diabetes. Until one day when she left work determined to stick to one of her serial diets, but soon found herself eating an ice cream, as if on autopilot. It sparked an epiphany - she realised the solution to her many failed diets lay in her unconscious. In the powerful, instinctual part of her brain.   

It's1942, and Dolly dreams of distant lands. As the war rages on, excitement comes in the form of American GIs posted in London. Although Dolly is engaged to Tony, she can't help but fall in love with Joe, a dashing American.

You wouldn’t be ‘barking mad’ if, when asked the definition of certain phrases, ‘the cat got your tongue’ and you ‘clammed up’. Let’s not ‘beat around the bush’; the English language is littered with linguistic quirks that, on closer examination, seem utterly fantastical. In Spilling the Beans on the Cat’s Pyjamas, Judy Parkinson explores the many colourful – but rather incomprehensible – phrases that enhance our language, describing their origins and defining their true meanings.

It’s two years after the events of ‘Girl, Missing’ and life is not getting any easier for sixteen-year-old Lauren, as exam pressure and a recent family tragedy take their toll. Lauren’s birth mother takes Lauren and her two sisters on holiday in the hope that some time together will help, but a few days into the holiday one of the sisters disappears, under circumstances very similar to those in which Lauren was taken years before.

Six years have passed since the end of Sister, Missing and Madison is now a teenager. During a visit to older sister Lauren, she learns that their biological father was an anonymous sperm donor and sets out to track him down. Her search bears fruit sooner than she expects, but is the father she discovers all he seems? As Madison gets drawn into a mysterious investigation involving missing girls and secret hideaways, she finds herself in more and more danger...

Once again Anthony Quinn shows himself a master at writing fiction that works on every level. London, May 1945. Freya Wyley, 20, meets Nancy Holdaway, 18, amid the wild celebrations of VE Day, the prelude to a devoted and competitive friendship that will endure on and off for the next two decades.

Sisters Connie and Jenny Dalton have always taken it for granted that there will be food on the table and a roof over their heads. In their comfortable house they're sheltered from the deprivation in which their housemaid Molly lives with her family in nearby Rotherhithe. Everything changes in April 1912. As the girls wave their father off on the Titanic's maiden voyage, little do they know that soon he will rest in a watery grave.

For sixteen-year-old Mary Harris, growing up in Rotherhithe in 1934 has its ups and downs. She has a good job in a biscuit factory and a best friend, Liz, who's fun to be with, but she's worried about her younger brother Eddie. Eddie is a difficult child whose bad behaviour affects the whole family. Although Mary's stepfather Ted denies losing his temper with the boy, Mary's seen the bruises on Eddie's small body.

When Fran Varady is approached by Private Detective Clarence Duke, she mistrusts him on instinct, but she can't ignore what he has to say. Her mother, Eva, who walked out on Fran when she was only seven, has hired Clarence to find her daughter. And for good reason. Eva is dying.

Summoned to the riverside by the desperate, scribbled note of an old friend, Jem Flockhart and Will Quartermain find themselves on board the seamen's floating hospital, an old hulk known only as The Blood, where prejudice, ambition and murder seethe beneath a veneer of medical respectability. Onshore, a young woman, a known prostitute, is found drowned in a derelict boatyard. A man leaps to his death into the Thames, driven mad by poison and fear. The events are linked - but how?

In May 1943, a young, pregnant Frenchwoman called Lucie Aubrac engineered the escape of her husband Raymond from the clutches of Klaus Barbie, the feared Gestapo chief. She later ambushed the prison vans in which members of the Resistance were being driven to an almost certain death. Spirited out of France by the RAF at the end of 1943, nine months pregnant, she arrived in London a heroine. In 1983, when both Aubracs had retired, Klaus Barbie was put on trial in France.

This inspiring anthology collects enduring and entertaining stories that have enthralled young and old, by the cherished authors whose tales have captivated children for generations. Perfect for the family car trip or at-home listening, these recordings sparkle with the wit and wonder of time-tested storytelling.

This is the second book in a series featuring Fran Varady, who is insolvent, unemployed, nearly homeless, but remains resolute. When she meets a down-and-out who has witnessed a kidnapping, Fran is soon on the case.

It's 1943. When Babs Scott loses her beloved parents in an air raid, she is left homeless and alone. The Land Army offers her a new life away from the bombed streets of Rotherhithe and, despite the backbreaking toil, Babs loves the fresh, clean air and green fields of Sussex. Soon the farm begins to feel like home and, with the support of fellow Land Girl Lydi Wells, Babs starts to heal. Then two Italian prisoners of war are sent to the farm to work and Babs's safe world collapses again.