Showing results by narrator "Penelope Penelope Rawlins" in All Categories

Every Season the beaux mondes of the Regency would hire a house in the heart of London's fashionable West End at a disproportionately high rent for often inferior accommodation and yet No.67 Clarges Street, a town house complete with staff, remains vacant from year to year.

June 1940. As World War Two rages, Daphne Devine remains in London, performing each night as assistant to stage magician Jonty Trevelyan, aka the Grand Mystique. Then the secret service call. For, aware of Hitler's belief in the occult, the war office has set up a hidden cohort to exploit this quirk in the enemy's chain of command. Daphne and Jonty find themselves far from the glitz and glamour of the theatre, deep inside the lower levels of Wormwood Scrubs prison. Here, they join secret ranks of occultists, surrealists, and other eccentrics co-opted to the war effort.

Dian Fossey's classic account of four gorilla families - one of the most important books ever written about our connection to the natural world. For 13 years Dian Fossey lived and worked with Uncle Bert, Flossie, Beethoven, Pantsy and Digit in the remote rain forests of the volcanic Virunga Mountains in Africa, establishing an unprecedented relationship with these shy and affectionate beasts. In her base camp, 10,000 feet above sea-level, she struggled daily with rain, loneliness and the ever-constant threat of poachers who slaughtered her beloved gorillas with horrifying ferocity.

Jenny Shephard is twelve years old and missing. Her teacher, Sarah Finch, knows better than most that the chances of finding her alive are diminishing every day. As a little girl Sarah's older brother went out to play and never come home. The strain of not knowing what happened to him tore her family apart. When Sarah finds Jenny's body, beaten and abandoned in the woods near her home, she is drawn into the heart of the investigation and a media storm. Her presence at the scene arouses suspicions. But it is not just the police that are watching her.

Louise Young is a devoted single mother whose only priority is providing for her daughter, Mia. Louise has a good job in a huge international corporation and she's grateful for it. The only problem is her boss who can't keep his hands to himself, but Louise can handle him. What she really doesn't have time for is romance - until she meets the company's rising star, Josh Wallace. Louise usually says no to evenings out but she's decided to let her hair down tonight.

DEATH AT FRANCIS COURT NOW CONFIRMED AS MURDER! Speculation is rife that the victim, estate manager Alex Sterling (44), was found by Lady Beatrice (35), the Countess of Rossex, niece of King James. Lady Beatrice, who has finally come out of hiding following her son's departure to boarding school, has been managing the project to refurbish and redesign the Events Suite at Francis Court, alongside Perry Juke.

Haunting, compelling, this psychological thriller will have you hooked. Perfect for fans of Gone Girl and Daughter. Best friends are there for each other through thick and thin. You trust them with your life. At least that's what Emma, Daisy, Leanne, and Al think. But all that changes when they embark on a trip of a lifetime together. When they return home, only two of them are left alive, and the group has been torn apart by lies and deception. Many years later, when the dust has settled and life has moved on, one girl receives a threatening letter.

Paris, 1750. In the midst of winter, as birds fall frozen from the sky, a new maid arrives at the home of a celebrated clockmaker and his clever, unworldly daughter. But rumours are stirring that Reinhart's uncanny mechanical creations - bejewelled birds, silver spiders - are more than mere automata. That they might defy the laws of nature, perhaps even at the expense of the living. But Madeleine is hiding a dark past, and a dangerous purpose - to discover the truth of the clockmaker's experiments and record his every move, in exchange for her own chance of freedom.

A woman is accused of killing her husband, but is she guilty? Inspired by a true historical case, this spellbinding novel will keep you guessing until the final heart-stopping revelation....

A rowdy family comes to stay at the holiday cottages where Laura's mum works. Laura notices that they are always leaving their puppy behind, and so she offers to take it for walks. But when the family is forced to leave, Laura finds herself having to say good-bye to the little dog much sooner than she thought....

Now, you obviously, would never, ever look up your exes on Facebook. Nooo. And even if you did, you most certainly wouldn't run off trying to track them down, risking your job, family and happiness in the process. Posy Fairweather, on the other hand...Posy is delighted when Matt proposes - on top of a mountain, in a gale, in full-on romantic mode. But a few days’ later disaster strikes: he backs out of the engagement. Crushed and humiliated, Posy starts thinking.

First appearing in 1782, Dangerous Liaisons is one of the most scandalous and controversial novels in European literature. The plot unfolds through a series of letters as the two main protagonists, the Vicomte de Valmont and the Marquise de Merteuil, attempt to bring about the seduction of a young woman. The epistolary nature of the novel gives a multi-faceted perspective of the action, which places the book firmly in the tradition of libertine literature.

The architect of treachery has been revealed...and Sister Adamanthea is in his clutches. The arch-heretic believes he can bend the devout Battle Sister to his cause, and will stop at nothing to turn one of the Adepta Sororitas away from the Emperor's light and into the embrace of Chaos. Adamanthea must set aside her doubts and fears and marshal her faith in the Emperor if she is to resist temptation and defeat the traitors in her midst.

A reclusive ex-film star living in the wilds of Ireland, Claudette Wells is a woman whose first instinct, when a stranger approaches her home, is to reach for her shotgun. Why is she so fiercely protective of her family, and what made her walk out of her cinematic career when she had the whole world at her feet? Her husband, Daniel, reeling from a discovery about a woman he last saw 20 years ago, is about to make an exit of his own. It is a journey that will send him off-course, far away from the life he and Claudette have made together.

Vicky Seagrave is blessed: three beautiful children, a successful, doting husband, great friends and a job she loves. She should be perfectly happy. When she makes a split-second decision that risks everything she holds dear, there's only person she trusts enough to turn to. But Vicky is about to learn that one mistake is all it takes - that if you're careless with those you love, you don't deserve to keep them....

One of Sarah's daughters died. But can she be sure which one? A terrifying psychological thriller that will chill you to the bone. A year after one of their identical twin daughters, Lydia, died in an accident, Angus and Sarah Moorcraft move to the tiny Scottish island Angus inherited from his grandmother, hoping to put together the pieces of their shattered lives. But when their surviving daughter, Kirstie, claims they have mistaken her identity - that she, in fact, is Lydia - their world comes crashing down once again.

Special Agent Will Trent has something to hide. Something he doesn’t want Dr Sara Linton – the woman he loves – to find out. He’s gone undercover in Macon, Georgia and put his life at risk. And he knows Sara will never forgive him if she discovers the truth. But when a young Macon patrolman is shot and left for dead Sara is forced to confront the past and a woman she hoped never to see again. And without even knowing it, she becomes involved in the same case Will is working on. Soon both of their lives are in danger.

London, 1921 - Jean Buckman, a young and innocent American heiress arrives in England to find a society decimated by war but resolutely clinging to the status quo. She marries Edward Warre an engaging but complex man and the owner of a once great but now struggling estate. As the marriage falters, Jean spends her summers in the South of France where she embarks on a passionate affair that will have repercussions for the rest of her life.

It's up to the servants of No. 67 Clarges Street to hatch a scheme... and arrange a match! "Oh, to be as beautiful as Euphemia!" sighs plain Jane Hart when she joins her sister at No.67 for the Season, as then Lord Tregarthan might notice her... as she has noticed him and forever lost her heart. And while it is Euphemia's fate to flit her way through balls and into the arms of a marquis, Jane's is to stay at home... until the Downstairs staff transform the plain Miss into the Season's sensation and send her waltzing into a daring liaison with the man of her dreams!

When Ellen Carr abandons grey, dreary London to become housekeeper at an experimental school in Austria, she soon knows she's found her calling. Swept into an idyllic world of mountains, music, eccentric teachers and wayward children, Ellen brings order and joy to all around her. But it's the handsome, mysterious gardener, Marek, who intrigues her - Marek, who has a dangerous secret. As Hitler's troops march across Europe, Ellen finds she has promises to keep, even if it means sacrificing her future happiness.