Showing results by narrator "Juanita McMahon" in All Categories

Beryl Jenkinson is a young dreamer determined to break free. Though bound to her family’s garage, her heart dreams of taking flight with Attagirls, the brave women piloting planes across the nation to play a vital role in the war effort. Odette de Lavigne embodies the allure of a World War Two pin-up girl: glamorous, seductive, and a masterful pilot. But beneath her carefree demeanor lies a poignant secret.

It's February, and Carnival time in Venice. Bright blue skies and freezing temperatures welcome forensic pathologist Teresa Lupo to the city. Teresa has taken time out from her job to find her beloved bohemian aunt Sofia who has mysteriously disappeared. There seem to be no clues as to her whereabouts, but a visit to Sofia's very strange apartment in the Dorsoduro confirms Teresa’s suspicions that all is not well....

November, 1957: Six teenage girls walk in the churning Derbyshire mists. Their voices carrying across the fields, they follow the old train tracks into the dark tunnel of the Cutting. Only five appear on the other side. October, 2014: a dying mother, feverishly fixated on a friend from her childhood, makes a plea: 'Find Valerie.' Mina's elderly mother had never discussed her childhood with her daughter before. So who was Valerie? Where does her obsession spring from? DC Connie Childs is partnered up with new arrival to Bampton, Peter Dahl.

79-year-old Gloria Frensham is a hoarder. She lives amongst piles of magazines, cardboard boxes and endless knickknacks that are stacked into every room of her home and teeter in piles along the landing and up the stairs. She hasn’t left the house in years, but when a sudden smell of burning signifies real danger, she is forced to make a sudden departure and leave behind her beloved possessions. Determined she’s not ready for a care home, Gloria sets out to discover what life still has to offer her.

Paul lives in the Welsh countryside with his wife Elise, and their two young children. Over in London, Cora plans to move back to Cardiff, to the house she has inherited from her parents. She is escaping her marriage, and the constrictions and disappointments of her life. Connecting them is the London train, and a chance meeting that will have immediate and far-reaching consequences for both Paul and for Cora.

The class of ’72, Sara, Ally, Jo and Mitch were as close as sisters, then life intervened and the four friends lost touch. Now in her 60s, Sara has realised - late in the day - that those women were the best friends she’d ever had and is determined to get the gang back together. Ally is facing a huge turning point in her life and Jo, after years of being chief cook and bottle washer, needs to put herself first after a wake-up call. None of them know what happened to Mitch.

Maud Heaston has been in love with Beatrice Williams since they first met in 1939. They’ve been through hell and back; family, careers, and secrets have threatened to tear them apart, but their love has endured it all. Until now. Old age and illness have forced them into separate nursing homes and the family Maud trusted to take care of them are only out for themselves.

Willow and Holly are identical twins. They’re alike in every way, except one - Willow is afraid on the inside. And it is all because of a secret - one that binds the sisters closely together. For a very long time Willow has felt separated from Holly by one terrible moment in time - a moment that meant Willow’s life was never the same again. And when the past catches up with her, Willow realises it’s finally time for her to face her fears, and learn to laugh again.

Six months ago, city girl Sophie Mills gave up everything to move to Cornwall. All to be with the man she thinks she loves, and his two daughters who she knows she loves. But adjusting to life as a semi-permanent mother in the countryside isn't quite as easy as Sophie imagined it would be.

Life hasn’t always been kind to Emma, but now finally her life appears to be looking up. She and her childhood sweetheart, Seth Jago, are to marry. However, when Emma is haunted by mysterious circumstances surrounding her family, and Seth is hounded by a jealous ex-lover set on revenge, Seth plans for their escape to Canada. But Emma finds herself uncertain of whether a move to Canada is really what she wants…

Here are six magical stories to thrill and enchant you. Listen as Blackberry Blue rises from the bramble patch; follow Emeka the pathfinder on his mission to save a lost king; and join Princess Desire as she gallops across the Milky Way on her jet-black horse. These beautifully written and original stories will delight listeners of all ages.

Beautiful, proud Roxana is terrified of being poor. When her husband leaves her penniless with five children, she must choose between being a virtuous beggar or a rich whore. Embarking on a career as a courtesan and kept woman, Roxana passes from man to man in order to maintain her lavish, glamorous lifestyle. But this life comes at a cost; she is torn between sinful prosperity and the respectability she craves.

Fancy getting snowed in with your family over Christmas? No. Neither did the Thorne family. But that's what happens when, on Christmas Eve, the remote village where they've gathered together gets cut off by the worst winter storms of two hundred and fifty years. Temperatures plummet. Winds howl at ninety miles an hour. Snowdrifts pile high and freeze. Roads become impassable.

One night is enough to swallow a lifetime of lives. When Ruth Ardingly and her family first drive up from London and view The Well, they are enchanted by a jewel of a place. But the locals suspect foul play in its verdant fields and drooping fruit trees, and Ruth becomes increasingly isolated as she struggles to explain why her land flourishes whilst her neighbours' produce withers and dies. Fearful of envious locals and suspicious of those who seem to be offering help, Ruth grows less and less sure whom she can trust.

When Adela discovers she has a terminal illness, her thoughts turn to Tereza, the American-raised daughter she gave up at birth. Leaving behind her moody, grown son, Roman in their native Czech village, she flies to the United States to find the long-lost daughter who never knew her. In New York City, Tereza is working as the star researcher for two suspicious biotech moguls hellbent on developing a 'god pill' to extend human life indefinitely. But before Tereza can find a cure for Adela, her mother dies mysteriously.

When Rocco de Marco, legendary financier and billionaire, finds Gracie O’Brien breaking into his office he doesn’t believe in her innocence - so he decides to keep her close until he finds the truth. Yet it’s impossible for Rocco to stay angry with the sparky redhead - she’s making him feel emotions Rocco thought he’d buried for ever… And the sexual tension between them is explosive!

In the 17th century, a wall is built around the deer park of a great house. Wychwood is a world in itself, its ornamental lakes and majestic avenues planned by Mr Norris, a master of the new art of landscaping. A world where, after decades of civil war, everyone has something to hide or something to fear, where dissidents hide in the forest and Londoners fleeing the plague are at the gate.

In War Crimes for the Home we meet an old and forgetful Gloria, living in an old folks' home called Sea View. But when she met Ron, he was a handsome American pilot, and she was working in a munitions factory in Bristol during the Blitz. Now, 50 years on, Gloria starts to remember what happened....

If you asked the folks of Gyrford, they'd tell you Jedediah Smith looked up to his father. After all, Corbie Mackem was the Sarsen Shepherd: the man who saved the Smith clan from Ab, the terrifyingly well-meaning fey who blighted a whole generation with unwanted gifts. Corbie was a good fairy-smith. And if he wasn't a good father, well, that isn't something Jedediah likes to talk about. Especially since no one knows where Corbie's body lies: the day of his son's wedding, forty-odd years ago, he set off to travel and was never seen again.

Two Jewish sisters, one in London, the other in Warsaw, see their worlds fall apart as Hitler invades Poland. Hanna escapes The Blitz, while her sister and parents are forced into the Ghetto. Hanna joins the Special Operations Executive in an attempt to free her family from the ever-tightening Nazi stranglehold, and is aided by a Polish woman who befriends them. Casting light into one of the darkest periods of World War II, acclaimed author V.S. Alexander's powerful novel tells of two Jewish sisters of Polish descent who unite in a fight to save their family from the Warsaw Ghetto.