Showing results by publisher "Wavesound from W. F. Howes Ltd" in Genre Fiction

In 1890, artist Edward Burne-Jones finished a monumental series of paintings inspired by Sleeping Beauty. Told through the eyes of the five women in his life - wives, daughters and mistresses of famous artists - this is the astonishing story behind that famous painting - a story of love, obsession, scandal and betrayal.

In the fall of 2011, a heartbroken young man flees Australia for the USA. Landing in the excessive, uncanny-familiar glamour and plenitude of New York City, Will makes a vow to say yes to everything that comes his way. By fate or random chance, Will's journey takes him deep into the American heartland where he meets Wayne Gage, a fast-living, troubled Vietnam veteran, would-be spirit guide and collector of exotic animals. These two men in crisis form an unlikely friendship, but Will has no idea just how close to the edge Wayne truly is.

Bridget and Simone aren't friends. But their daughters are in the same dance troupe, so they're flying to Los Angeles for the girls to perform at Disneyland. Simone's daughter Zahra is indisputably a leader in the group, but Bridget's daughter Becky is a talent on the rise. Simone and her husband are accustomed to business class, but Bridget is less comfortable there. Both lonely women are surprised to find something in common, until Bridget discovers images of Zahra and other dancers that shock her. Are they exploitative or art?

It is the winter of 1985. Hope Farm sticks out of the ragged landscape like a decaying tooth, its weatherboard walls sagging into the undergrowth. Silver's mother, Ishtar, has fallen for the charismatic Miller, and the three of them have moved to the rural hippie commune to make a new start. But here, at just 13, she is thrust into an unrelenting adult world, and the walls begin to come tumbling down, with deadly consequences.

After a disastrous marriage, December Doyle has returned to her hometown to try to pick up the pieces of her life and start again. She's also intent on helping breathe new life into the Christmas Creek township, so the last thing she needs is trouble. Bad boy Seth Hunter has also returned to Christmas Creek, and trouble is his middle name. Wrongly convicted of a serious crime in his youth, Seth is now a successful businessman, but he's intent on settling some old scores. As teenagers, December and Seth were madly in love, and seeing each other again reawakens past feelings.

London, 1942. When art school graduate Eleanor Roy is recruited by the War Artists Advisory Committee, she comes one step closer to realising her dream of becoming one of the few female war artists. But breaking into the art establishment proves difficult until Eleanor meets painter Jack Valante, only to be separated by his sudden posting overseas. Melbourne, 2010. Although reluctant to leave her family at home, Kathryn can't refuse her grandmother Eleanor's request to travel to London to help her return a precious painting to its artist.

Carla is a young doctor striving to become the first female surgeon at a prestigious Melbourne hospital. When a consultant post opens up, she competes with her lover for the job and thinks she can be judged on merit. But an assault after a boozy workplace dinner leaves her traumatised and struggling to cope with the misogyny coming from every corner of her workplace. Recovering her fragmented memories from that night, Carla begins a fight for justice which will shake the foundations of the hospital she loves.

Camille is a nurse specialising in supporting families through the difficult decision to donate the organs of their dying loved ones. Camille's mother is a gifted but uncompromising transplant surgeon determined to make it in a man's world until her own life falls apart. And Camille herself is a mother to Addie–five years old, critically ill and in desperate need of the very organs her mother and grandmother work with.

An estranged father. An abused and abusive mother. An army of relatives. A tapestry of violence, woven across generations and geographies, from Turkey to Lebanon to Western Sydney. This is the legacy left to Jamal Smith, a young queer Muslim trying to escape a past in which memory and rumour trace ugly shapes in the dark. When every thread in life constricts instead of connects, how do you find a way to breathe? Torn between faith and fear, gossip and gospel, family and friendship, Jamal must find and test the limits of love.

Busy mum-of-four Lizzie, newly divorced Sam and single mum Megan are best mates. And after a couple of decent coffees, they reckon they can handle anything. So when Baytree Primary calls out for volunteers to help at an upcoming camp, these three jump at the chance. Because nothing ever goes wrong at school camp, right?

Someone is hiding a secret - one that could change Berry's life and alter her tragic past. As a child, Berry McCalister's family was torn apart by shocking violence. Eleven years on, she returns to the small town of Harlington, determined to confront the past and, finally, to cut all ties and sell the family farm. Complicating her desire to get out of Harlington, Berry is drawn to her childhood crush, Nate Tarant. He never knew she existed back then, but things change, and this time Nate seems to be very much aware of her presence.

Meet the Jansen family: Since the weekend of the party–the one twenty-two year old Liv can’t remember, the one that left her covered in bruises–she’s been locked out of her bedroom by a padlock. Her parents are behaving oddly and her best friend won’t respond to her texts. Maybe she really was out of control that night. The guilt is getting to her father, Janus. He brought his family from Australia to L.A. to chase his dream of seeing his novel on the big screen, and he can’t let them down. Not again. But he’s not sure he can do what is necessary to keep this secret hidden.

A year after her husband Leo's death, widow Daisy invites her three adult children to join her for a holiday in beautiful Venice. It will be wonderful, having them under one roof again in their father's birthplace. But is it possible to recapture the past? Her son Marc's marriage is in jeopardy, but for his mother's sake he convinces his wife to keep up appearances. Anna is trying to hide the truth about the dismal state of her London acting career; and Ellie, enjoying a gap year and uncertain about her future choices, wants to avoid family pressure to conform.

Mai and Hikaru went to school together in the city of Nagoya, until Hikaru disappeared when they were 18. It is not until 10 years later, when Mai runs into Hikaru's mother, Hiromi Sato, that she learns Hikaru has become a hikikomori, a recluse unable to leave his bedroom for years. In secret, Hiromi Sato hires Mai as a 'rental sister', to write letters to Hikaru and encourage him to leave his room.

Two women stand in the shallows, a man dead at their feet, while around them buildings burn. Amid the ruins of a fire-ravaged amusement park and destroyed waterfront dwellings, one boarded-up building still stands. May has come from Australia to Loveland, Nebraska, to claim the house on the poisoned lake as part of her grandmother's will. Escaping the control of her husband, will she find refuge or danger?

For paramedics Tash and Joel, a regular workday is like a supercut of the worst days of other people’s lives. They maintain their sanity through a friendship built on black humour, but as the constant exposure to trauma takes its toll, both, in different ways, must fight to preserve their mental health and relationships - even with one another. How much pressure can they handle, and what will happen when they finally crack?

Alice had not expected to spend most of the twenty-first century writing about Leonard Woolf. When she stood on Morell Bridge watching fireworks explode from the rooftops of Melbourne at the start of a new millennium, she had only two thoughts. One was: the fireworks are better in Sydney. The other was: is Y2K going to be a thing? Y2K was not a thing. But there were worse disasters to come: Environmental collapse. The return of fascism. Wars. A sexual reckoning. A plague.

Gwen Hill adores Green Valley Avenue. So when the house next door is sold, Gwen wonders how the new family will settle into this cosy community. More than a new home, it's a clean slate for Frankie, who has moved her brood in a bid to save her marriage. To maintain privacy and corral her children, Frankie proposes a fence between the properties, destroying Gwen's picture-perfect front yard. To Gwen, this is an act of war.

A young fisherman is missing from the crayfish boats in the West Australian town of Stark. There's no trace at all of Elliot, there hasn't been for some weeks and Paul, his younger brother, is the only one who seems to be active in the search. Taking Elliot's place on the boat skippered by their troubled cousin, Paul soon learns how many opportunities there are to get lost in those many thousands of kilometres of lonely coastline.

Twenty-six-year-old Nicole Najim is struggling to find herself after a painful breakup, just when she thought she was going to settle down. Working a dead-end job in the family car dealership and at a loose end, she picks up her camera and returns to the melting pot of Sydney’s West to rediscover her roots. When she catches up with childhood friend, Danny, who makes his living in a shadowy underworld, their relationship intensifies just as the law starts to close in.