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"When it’s announced that 1958 will be the last year debutantes are to be presented at court, thousands of eager mothers and hopeful daughters flood the palace with letters seeking the year’s most coveted invitation – a chance for their daughters to curtsey...
"A thrilling tale of love, loyalty, and espionage, based on the incredible true story of Elizabeth Bentley, a Cold War double agent spying for the Russians and the United States ... 1963: Reeling from the death of her mother and President Kennedy's.....
One hundred and eighty petty convicts are on board the RAJAH, all sentenced to transportation to Australia. Kezia makes it her duty to redeem them, enlisting a select few to create an intricate quilt. With each stitch, they are tied closer together. Then...
Oslo, 1938. War is in the air and Europe is in turmoil. Hitler's Germany has occupied Austria and is threatening Czechoslovakia; there's a civil war in Spain and Mussolini reigns in Italy. When a woman turns up at the office of police-turned-private....
1943. After the heartache of the previous year, Connie Baxter now appears to have everything a girl could want. There is Ace, a man who loves her. She enjoys an enviable lifestyle despite the deprivations of war. She has friends and a job she adores as...
For the district nurses of Victory Walk, there's been little time to bask in the triumph of D-Day. London faces a new threat - the terrifying V-1 flying bombs which can strike anywhere out of the blue. New nurse Iris must adjust not only to living in...
Liverpool, 1939. Olivia Campbell appears to have the perfect life. However, behind closed doors, she lives in constant fear of her abusive father, and has no support from her mother. Longing for love and affection, she begins a relationship with Ted,...
London, 1918. Twenty-year-old Emily Burdon has been training as a nurse, learning on the job as she tends to patients from the crowded poorhouses that ring the hospital as well as wounded soldiers. She pours her heart into her nursing while she waits...
Growing up in extreme poverty in London, Pearl thinks life can get no worse. But when her parents discover there's yet another baby on the way, they have to tighten the belt even further. Pearl's mother decides to send her and her younger sister Eliza...
Ruby Caselton may only be twenty-five years old, but she already has the weight of the world on her shoulders. Heavily pregnant with her second child, penniless and exhausted, she is moving her family into a new home. The Caseltons left their last place...
"Audrey Parker's life changes forever when Pearl Harbor is attacked on December 7, 1941. Her brother, a talented young Navy pilot, had been stationed there, poised to fulfill their late father's distinguished legacy. Fresh out of nursing school with a...
"Georgeanna 'Georgey' Woolsey isn’t meant for the world of lavish parties and the demure attitudes of women of her stature. So when war ignites the nation, Georgey follows her passion for nursing during a time when doctors considered women on the battlefront...
"While caring for her grandmother, Kristin encounters the brother she long thought dead. In shock, she volunteers to care for her brother's injured friend, Ilian. As Ilian recovers, an attraction sparks between them, but both are dealing with problems...
"It's the spring of 1969, and Lakshmi, now married to Dr. Jay Kumar, directs the Healing Garden in Shimla. Malik has finished his private school education. At twenty, he has just met a young woman named Nimmi when he leaves to apprentice at the Facil...
"New York, 1954. A Fifth Avenue address, parties at the Plaza, two healthy sons and the ideal husband: what looks like a perfect life for Katharina Edgeworth is anything but. As a single girl in 1940s Manhattan, Katharina was a translator at the newly...
Liverpool, 1940. When war comes to Britain, Jessica Wilson and her friend Ruby seize the opportunity to leave behind the orphanage they grew up in and start new lives in the NAAFI. With only forged papers as identification, the girls expect to be turned...
West Yorkshire, 1904. When newly graduated nurse Ruby May takes a position looking after the children of Charles and Lilian England, a wealthy couple from a powerful dynasty of mill owners, she hopes it will be the fresh start she needs. But as she adapts...
Winter, 1939. Nancy is desperately trying to keep up her children's spirits - and her own - as they face their first Christmas without Bert. Young Patty should be excited to be spending the festive season with her sweetheart Archie - but why does she...
1915. After the recent dramatic events at the Post Office's Home Depot, Milly Woods is looking forward to spending as much time as possible with her best friends Beth and Nora. With Christmas fast approaching, their job of getting millions of letters...
As Christmas approaches, Alice, Edith and Marg continue to face hardships growing up on one of the poorest streets in Blackpool. Penniless, their friendship has helped them survive this far, but it'll take more than that to see them through the dark days...
It's 1941, and Christmas is approaching in St Ives. Shy Lily wishes she could hide from the war. But when her friend Eva asks if she will join her in working at a servicemen's convalescent home, Lily can't refuse. Eva came to St Ives to be near Max, ...
"Madeleine Talmage Force attracts the attention of John Jacob 'Jack' Astor. Despite their twenty-nine-year age difference, and the scandal of Jack's recent divorce, Madeleine falls headlong into love - and becomes the press's favorite target. On their...
"When they are little girls, Cibi, Magda and Livia make a promise to their father - that they will stay together, no matter what. Years later, Livia is ordered to Auschwitz by the Nazis. Cibi remembers their promise and follows Livia there, determined...
"Whispered secrets about her parents' past take on new urgency for Chariline as she pays one last visit to the land of her forefathers, the ancient kingdom of Cush. Raised as an orphan by her aunt, Chariline has only been told a few pieces of her par...
"Best friends Audrey Barrett and Eve Dawson are looking forward to celebrating Christmas in postwar America, thrilled at the prospect of starting new traditions with their five-year-old sons. But when the Sears Christmas Wish Book arrives and the boys...
"Cast out of the royal court by Eleanor of Aquitaine, deemed too coarse and rough-hewn for marriage or courtly life, seventeen-year-old Marie de France is sent to England to be the new prioress of an impoverished abbey, its nuns on the brink of starvation...
"Restless with the familiarity of her Alabama home, Ellie Fields accepts a teaching job in a tiny Louisiana town deep in bayou country. Though rightfully suspicious of outsiders, most of the people in tiny Bernadette, Louisiana, come to appreciate the...
"To his customers and neighbors on 125th street, Carney is an upstanding salesman of reasonably-priced furniture, making a life for himself and his family. He and his wife Elizabeth are expecting their second child, and if her parents on Striver's Row...
When they are little girls, Cibi, Magda and Livia make a promise to their father - that they will stay together, no matter what. Years later, Livia is ordered to Auschwitz by the Nazis. Cibi remembers their promise and follows Livia there, determined...
Ireland, 1851. After enduring years of the devastating potato famine, Ellen Kittrick is a survivor. To put food on the table, and to stop the landowner's agent from tearing down their cottage due to unpaid rent, Ellen defies her family and works at a...
The year is 1969, and Jack Sheffield is a young teacher in need of a job. In a room full of twenty-nine other newly qualified teachers, he's overjoyed when he's appointed to Heather View Primary. Jack is excited to start his first year there and to b...
London, 1917. After her parents died in a tragic accident, Victoria did everything she could to keep her siblings safe and off the streets. Working at the Foyles bookshop with her best friends is a dream come true - but now the war has put everything...
Spring 1944. As the Allied forces push closer to longed-for victory, Lily Collins yearns to join up and do her bit. But her best friend Gladys faces having her first baby alone, with her beloved Bill back with the Navy. And their other great friend, Beryl,...
England, 1941. As nurse Jo Brooks arrives at Mill Road Hospital, a ward takes a direct hit from a bomb. Pulling herself from the rubble, Jo's first priority must be her patients... but she can't stop herself frantically searching for her friend Moira....
Mary is a driver for the ATA, and although she yearns to fly a Spitfire, she fears her humble background will hold her back. After all, glamorous Angela is set to be the next 'Atta girl' on the recruitment posters; Bobbie learned to fly in her father's...
One ordinary street in Lancashire is getting ready for war. But who knows what else is going on behind the net curtains? Vicky Parrot wants more out of life than working all hours in her father's Post Office. Her dreams were ruined when tragedy came ...
"Jack tells the story of John Ames Boughton, the loved and grieved-over prodigal son of a Presbyterian minister in Gilead, Iowa, a drunkard and a ne'er-do-well. In segregated St Louis sometime after World War II, Jack falls in love with Della Miles, ...
"When the Great War breaks out in 1914 Thomas Mann, like so many of his fellow countrymen, is fired up with patriotism. He imagines the Germany of great literature and music, which had drawn him away from the stifling, conservative town of his childhood,...
"When Blaise Hill, a feisty young journalist from one of Sydney's toughest neighbourhoods, is dispatched to London at the dawn of the swinging sixties to report on Princess Margaret's controversial marriage to an unconventional photographer, she is drawn...
"Troy has fallen and the victorious Greeks are eager to return home with the spoils of an endless war - including the women of Troy themselves. They await a fair wind for the Aegean; it does not come, because the gods are offended. The body of King Priam...
"A murder, an innocent life, a hidden trunk, a journey across the ocean all in the name of love ... For ten years the McAlister family searched for their younger sister, Grace, who was lost to them when the three siblings were taken to Canada as British...
"After being stolen from her wealthy German parents and raised in the unforgiving wilderness of eastern Europe, a young woman finds herself alone in 1941 after her kidnapper dies. Her solitary existence is interrupted, however, when she happens upon a...
"Daisy Wilder prefers the company of horses to people, bare feet and salt water to high heels and society parties. Then, in the dizzying aftermath of the attack on Pearl Harbor, Daisy enlists in a top-secret program, replacing male soldiers in a war zone...
"Texas, 1921. A time of abundance. The Great War is over, the bounty of the land is plentiful, and America is on the brink of a new and optimistic era. But for Elsa Wolcott, deemed too old to marry in a time when marriage is a woman’s only option, the...
London 1917. As the Americans enter the War, there is renewed energy in the war effort. With husbands and sons fighting for freedom, the women of Harpers are left to tackle the day-to-day affairs at home and work. With Ben Harper away, Sally fears she...
August, 1797. When Mary Wollstonecraft's labour begins everything appears normal, and she anticipates being back at her usual occupations before too long. However, after her baby girl, her second daughter, is delivered, both mother and child will fight...
Following the departure of the formidable Editor from WOMAN'S FRIEND magazine, things are looking up for Emmeline Lake as she takes on the challenge of becoming a young wartime advice columnist. Her relationship with boyfriend Charles is blossoming, while...
When Violet loses her sister in the Blitz, she must take her nieces to safety in Cornwall. On the coast, she meets carefree chorus girl Eva, who is also running from the dangers of London. But Porthcurno hides a secret military base, and soon Violet and...
1940. As the Luftwaffe turns its attention to Liverpool, Shane Quinn decides to move his family back to the safety of Ireland. But his only child, Dana, refuses point-blank. Determined to make it on her own and defy her father's wishes, she heads to the...
London, 1865. Snow is falling fast, and Sally Suggs is working tirelessly to bring in enough money to keep bread on the table. Her father, a skilled rag-and-bone man, has fallen ill - and now Sally has taken up his trade. But this is a man's world, w...
Christmas sees Pennington's at its most glorious, thronged with shoppers, its grand staircase and balcony adorned with holly, mistletoe, tinsel and lights. It should be the happiest time, but dramas are seething beneath the surface. For Cornelia Culford,...
It's 1943, and the district nurses have two fresh recruits! As the country ramps up for D-Day, the new nurses are getting to know their patients on their patch in London's East End. Lily is quite sure of herself, and doesn't believe she has anything new...
"London, November 1941. Following the departure of the formidable Henrietta Bird from Woman's Friend magazine, things are looking up for Emmeline Lake as she takes on the challenge of becoming a young wartime advice columnist. Her relationship with b...
"In the spring of 1942, young Elzbieta Rabinek is aware of the swiftly growing discord just beyond the courtyard of her comfortable Warsaw home. She has no fondness for the Germans who patrol her streets and impose their curfews, but has never given ...
Bristol 1940 The Tobacco Girls cling together as they realise that the clouds of war are turning dark, the world is becoming more dangerous and their lives more unpredictable. Bridget Milligan's big, happy family fragments when her siblings are evacuated...
When Mara Gregory receives a letter from the father whom she believed to have died when she was a child, her world is turned upside down. Aaron Buchanan only discovered that he had a daughter a couple of years ago and now he's desperate to play a part...
Eighteen-year-old Connie Baxter works as an usherette at the Criterion Picture House in Gosport. Here she meets Vera, a cleaner at the cinema, and her niece, Babs, who sells ice creams. But when Connie falls for the charming Tommo Smith, her friendships...
When her beloved mistress dies, lady's maid Phoebe Parsons is forced onto the poverty-ridden streets of Manchester. Desperately searching for a new position, she finds herself living with thieves and drunks in the smog and squalor of the city - until...
Liverpool, 1935. Monica Savage is delighted when the Copperfields move in next door and she quickly becomes friends with Joan. Monica pursues her dream of becoming a hairdresser whilst Joan gets a job at Crawford's Biscuit Factory. But there are dark...
1937. Alice, Edith and Marg face hardships every day, growing up on one of the poorest streets in Blackpool. Alice is coping with a violent father, Marg is left reeling after a dark secret about her birth comes to light, and Edith is fighting to protect...
Abandoned by their parents and left to fight for themselves, headstrong Rosalind Carey has no choice but to take charge of her younger brothers and sister in Devonshire's grand Rockwood Castle. But their once much-loved home is crumbling like the family...
1911, Bath. Passionate suffrage campaigner Esther Stanbury works as a window dresser in Pennington's Department Store. She has hopes for women's progression and will do anything to help secure the vote. Owner of the prestigious Phoenix Hotel, Lawrence...
"Kentucky packhorse librarian Tansy Calhoun doesn't mind the rough trails and long hours as she serves her mountain community during the Great Depression. Even the rough people - like ornery Perdita Sweet - have their charms. But can love bloom in such...
"They came on boats, on trains, great unceasing waves of them-the poor, the disenfranchised, the seekers, the dreamers. Second and third generations of farmers eking out an existence on scraps of farms divided up among too many sons. Political agitators...
"Sir Phillip knew that Eloise Bridgerton was a spinster, and so he'd proposed, figuring that she'd be homely and unassuming, and more than a little desperate for an offer of marriage. Except . . . she wasn't. The beautiful woman on his doorstep was a...
"Inspired by the true World War II history of the few bookshops to survive the Blitz, The Last Bookshop in London is a timeless story of wartime loss, love and the enduring power of literature. August 1939: London prepares for war as Hitler's forces ...
"Warwickshire in the 1580s. Agnes is a woman as feared as she is sought after for her unusual gifts. She settles with her husband in Henley street, Stratford, and has three children: a daughter, Susanna, and then twins, Hamnet and Judith. The boy, Hamnet,...
1915. Beth Healey hopes that she will be able to forget the ghastly war and celebrate her 18th birthday, but her twin brother Ned announces that he has signed up to fight. Beth applies to join the Army Post Office's new Home Depot. She soon makes friends...
May 1941. Three young women join the war effort during the Yorkshire Blitz. Connie, an ARP warden, persuades her sister Lizzie to become an ambulance driver. Their friend Pamela is also keen to do her bit. As the women face a baptism of fire: the shock...
Lou Channer wants a life outside of North Devon, which she's never left. She yearns to contribute to the war effort and takes a job as a clerk in the Canadian Navy depot in Plymouth, lodging with other girls from the depot who take her under their wing....
London, 1914. One ordinary day, three girls arrive for work at London's renowned Foyles bookshop. And when war with Germany is declared, their lives will never be the same again... Alice has always been the 'sensible' one in her family - especially i...
Sheffield, 1939. With war declared, brave women step up and do their bit for their country. Housewife Nancy never dreamed that she'd end up in the Vickers steelworks factory, but when husband Bert is called up to serve, she needs to put food on the table...
As war finally draws to a close, what will victory and peacetime bring for the south coast's Bluebird Girls? In their rise to fame over the course of the war, Bea Herron, Ivy Sparrow and Rainey Bird have faced down bombs and looked tragedy in the eye....
"The Crucible meets True Grit in this riveting adventure story of a fugitive girl, a mysterious gang of robbers, and their dangerous mission to transform the Wild West. In the year of our Lord 1894, I became an outlaw. The day of her wedding, 17 year...
"Boston, 1662. Mary Deerfield is twenty-four-years-old. Her skin is porcelain, her eyes delft blue, and in England she might have had many suitors. But here in the New World, amid this community of saints, Mary is the second wife of Thomas Deerfield,...
The First World War is over and air mechanic Wally Shiers has promised to return home to his fiancé́e, Helena Alford. But Wally never reckoned on charismatic fighter pilot Ross Smith, and an invitation to compete in the world's most audacious air race....
Cornwall, 1929. Fiona Fox, youngest child of the celebrated Fox family, is a devoted volunteer at the local lifeboat station, giving all her free time and her energy to the selfless crew. But when she seizes a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do more,...
The war is almost over - and it's up to the East End Angels to keep the home fires burning! Frankie's fiancé, a doctor, is overseas looking after the troops - will he return safely home? Winnie has a happy secret - but can she carry on at Station 75 when...
Vera Sharples, the over-protected daughter of Ena, longs for independence, and while her mother wants to marry her off, she isn't keen on Bob Lomax, Vera's own choice for matrimony. Her friend, Lily Longhurst, has found herself on the wrong side of a...
Cathy was a happy, blushing bride when Britain went to war with Germany three years ago. But her youthful dreams were crushed by her violent husband Stanley's involvement with the fascist Blackshirts, and even when he's conscripted to fight she knows...
A life of poverty in a cramped pit cottage is all that 17-year-old Ruby Dinsdale has known. Even with her father and younger brother working at the coal mine, money is tight. Her mother Mary is skilled at stretching what little they have, but the sma...
"An incredible historical novel inspired by the true story behind the Boots empire. Jersey 1885. On the beautiful island of Jersey, Florence Rowe lives a quiet life working in her father's bookshop. Life for the Rowe family is good, but Florence can't...
"1553: deeply-divided England rejoices as the rightful heir, Mary Tudor, sweeps to power on a tide of populist goodwill. But the people should have been careful what they wished for: Mary's mission is to turn back time to an England of old. Within weeks...
"It is 1788. Twenty-one-year-old Elizabeth is hungry for life but, as the ward of a Devon clergyman, knows she has few prospects. When proud, scarred soldier John Macarthur promises her the earth one midsummer's night, she believes him. But Elizabeth...
"Adam and Polly Fitch face a bleak future after being sold for just five shillings to Miss Reed's orphanage by their bullying father. Missing their mother Minnie, and their three brothers still at home, they know they must stick together to survive. But...
"My name is Nat Davy. Perhaps you've heard of me? There was a time when people up and down the land knew my name, though they only ever knew half the story. The year of 1625, it was, when a single shilling changed my life. That shilling got me taken off...
"Evelyn Varley has always been ambitious and clever. As a girl, she earned a scholarship to a prestigious academy well above her parents’ means, gaining her a best friend from one of England’s wealthiest families. In 1939, with an Oxford degree in hand...
"Though Mussolini and the fascists have been defeated, the war has devastated Italy, especially the south. Seven-year-old Amerigo lives with his mother Antonietta in Naples, surviving on odd jobs and his wits like the rest of the poor in his neighborhood....
"1942. Sadie Gault is eighteen and living with her parents in the Kraków Ghetto during World War II. When the Nazis liquidate the ghetto, Sadie and her pregnant mother are forced to seek refuge in the perilous tunnels beneath the city. One day she sees...
"Most castles are protected by powerful men. This one by women ... A reluctant resistor ... 1940. French schoolteacher and aspiring artist Marthe Simone has an orphan's self-reliance and wants nothing to do with war. But as the realities of Nazi occu...
"When Sylvie Townsend's Polish ward, Rose, goes missing at the World's Fair, her life unravels. Brushed off by the authorities, Sylvie turns to her boarder and Rose's violin instructor, Kristof Bartok, for help searching the immigrant communities. When...
"A heart-stopping World War II story of three female code breakers at Bletchley Park and the spy they must root out after the war is over. 1940. As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very different women answer the call to mysterious country ...
"Elisabetta, Marco, and Sandro grow up as the best of friends despite their differences. Elisabetta is a feisty beauty who dreams of becoming a novelist; Marco the brash and athletic son in a family of professional cyclists; and Sandro a Jewish mathe...
"Escaping from an abusive marriage, seventeen-year-old Lakshmi makes her way alone to the vibrant 1950s pink city of Jaipur. There she becomes the most highly requested henna artist - and confidante - to the wealthy women of the upper class. But trusted...
In the aftermath of the General Strike, times are tough for coal miners and their families. When Cally loses her beloved mum, she hopes her father will comfort her. But instead she soon acquires a cruel stepmother, and Cally begins to fear that she is...
Bristol 1939. School leaver Maisie Miles suspects her father, a small-time crook, has an ulterior motive for insisting she gets a job at the W.D. & H.O. Wills tobacco factory but keeps it to herself. She's befriended by effervescent Phyllis Mason and...
Cornwall, 1891. Talented painter Edith Fairchild is poised to begin a life of newlywed bliss and artistic creation in the inspiring setting of Spindrift House, freshly inherited by her charming husband, Benedict. But when her honeymoon turns sour, her...
As the drums of war begin to beat louder on the continent, 17-year-old Jeannie McIver heads to the wilds of the Scottish Uplands to start life as a Land Girl. Jeannie soon falls in love with life on the busy Scottish hill farm. She even finds her int...
"Ironside Lake, Minnesota, January 1944. Headstrong and determined, linguistics student Johanna Berglund has very definite plans for her future ... plans that do not include returning to her hometown and the secrets and heartaches she left behind. But...
"She's going too far to go it alone. It is 1950. London is still reeling from World War II, and Margery Benson, a schoolteacher and spinster, is trying to get through life, surviving on scraps. One day, she reaches her breaking point, abandoning her job...
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