Showing results by publisher "Hodder & Stoughton" in Historical Fiction

A story of friendship, family, love and loss set against the grimy and glittering streets of '50s Soho. For fans of Kate Furnivall and Rachel Rhys. In a city of strangers, who can you trust? London, 1952. Dina Demetriou has travelled from Cyprus for a better life. She's certain that excitement, adventure and opportunity are out there, waiting - if only she knew where to look. Her passion for clothes and flair for sewing land her a job repairing the glittering costumes at the notorious Pelican Revue. It's here that she befriends the mysterious and beautiful Bebba.

1915. Patrolling is the last thing on the minds of Women's Police Service recruits Annie, Maggie and Poppy right now, because Annie and her fiancé Richard are about to get married. She's been waiting for this day her whole life, but when it finally comes it brings only heartache and Annie doesn't know if she can go on. The influx of soldiers to the capital means that the WPS's work is more important than ever, though, and Annie's country needs her. She and the girls are posted to the bustling heart of the city and she hopes the new job will distract her from her sorrow.

July 1942. Never has the outcome of the war been more uncertain. Britain might have ruled out any risk of invasion, but Stalin's Russia is bowing under the blows of Hitler's armies. The Nazis unleash an occult war in an attempt to tip the scales: whoever reunites the four sacred Swastikas will win. Double Agent Tristan Marcas sets out in search of the Romanov treasure, which is said to harbour the final relic. He's got no time to lose: the battle is about to come to a head.

1912. Released from the Secret Service, Wiggins sets out for New York and his lost lover, Bela. But after an altercation on board, he finds himself among the low-life of Britain's poorest city, Dublin. Wiggins falls in with gangster Patrick O'Connell and is soon driving the boss' girlfriend around town. Molly wants O'Connell to support her Irish nationalist cause and then they go to find them in America. Finally, Wiggins can solve the mystery of Bela - and meet his old mentor, Sherlock Holmes, in a story of escalating intrigue, danger and violence.

1361. Plague has returned to England - 13 years after the devastation of the Black Death. As destruction advances towards his estate in Kent, Oswald de Lacy leads his family to the safety of a remote castle in the marshes - where his friend Godfrey is preparing a fortress to survive the coming disaster. The rules are clear: once the de Lacys and other guests are inside the castle the portcullis will be lowered and no-one permitted to enter or leave until the Pestilence has passed. And then a murderer strikes.

After the death of his mother, young Alwin of Whittaker leaves the only home he has ever known to seek answers about his unknown father through a pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. On the journey, Alwin falls in with a band of violent and marauding soldiers and is witness to their terrible crimes. When Alwin later joins up with a group of pilgrims, he must hide his identity...but he is not the only one with secrets to keep. Rosamund, a young woman travelling the same path, has much to conceal too.

London, 1928. Lucy Darkwether has always made her own rules. After breaking off her engagement to pursue a degree in Ancient History, she's now the proud owner of London's newest antiquarian bookshop. So when a rival shop in Cecil Court is chosen to host an exhibition of Egyptian treasures, Lucy's pride is stung — until the grand opening ends in a gruesome murder. Is this the revenge of a disgraced colleague? A private vendetta? Or a curse visited upon those who disturb the past?

London, 1940: Farmer John Cook would rather avoid the city at the best of times. But as he watches Nazi bombers passing overhead in the moonlight, he knows he is exactly where he needs to be. A young woman has disappeared during an air raid and Cook links her to a network of spies. As his search continues, he realises more is at stake than he could have imagined. Occupied France: Lady Margaret is playing a dangerous game. To the German high-command she is a valuable prize. To the British, she has become the enemy, unless she can do the impossible...

Celebrated writer and historian Maria Graham must make the treacherous voyage from Brazil to London to deliver her latest book to her publisher. Having come to terms with the loss of her beloved husband, Maria is now determined to live her life as she pleases, free from the smothering constraints of Georgian society. For a woman travelling alone it's a journey fraught with danger, and as civil war rages around her, the only ship prepared to take Maria belongs to roguish smuggler Captain James Henderson.

In the genteel squares and stuccoed villas of late-Victorian Brighton, Ellen and Reynold Harper - twins, companions, colleagues, - ply their trade as portrait photographers. But at the golden hour, the girls arrive to pose for the lucrative - and dangerous - illicit photographs that really keep the Harpers' business afloat. This is the other, shadowy world of the city: a world of erotic tableaux, boundary-crossing music hall artistes, and the sinister figure of the local gangster, the Croc.

1913.Captain Scott and his four companions reach the South Pole to find their Norwegian rival Roald Amundsen has won the race. Defeated, they set out on the 850-mile journey to their ship. Apsley Cherry-Garrard, the explorer sent out to meet them at One Ton depot, peering South through thick spectacles, sees only an infinity of white, and turns back. A year later Scott's pitched tent is found, just ten miles from the depot, and the bodies within speak of hunger, the unbearable strain of hauling the sledge, and the brutal winter cold. They lie in a tomb of ice.

1944, New Mexico: Alice Katz is a young Jewish physicist, one of the only female doctoral students at her university, studying with the famous Dr Oppenheimer. Her well-to-do family wants her to marry and settle down. Instead, Alice answers her country's call to go deep into the desert and lend her skills to a secret project at the heart of the fight against Germany. At Los Alamos, Alice meets Caleb, who has been assigned to the explosives division. Around them are other young scientists and engineers who have left their ordinary lives behind.

Across the sea in England, Thomas Peach lives in quiet retirement. Some call him a magician, others a madman. But when his friend the poetess Arabella Farthingay falls prey to a sinister seducer, Mr Peach's fading powers are called on once more. He follows her to France - and into a world where reason contends with terror, brotherhood with bloodshed, and the last remnants of faith with the oldest enemy of them all...