Showing titles in World War II & Holocaust

Following the death of his beloved father, Arthur is sent to Canada for safety with a group of evacuees on the eve of the Second World War. Alone and afraid, plagued with seasickness, and an unknown future, he can't imagine things getting any worse. Far from what he feared, Arthur is welcomed with warmth and kindness. But even on the other side of the world, the war can’t be escaped and before long, his new family are touched by it too. Faced with another dramatic change in his life, everything starts to change again for Arthur.

1939: On the eve of war, young English heiress Grace Grey travels from London to the wilderness of Tasmania. Coaxed out of her shell by the attentions of her Irish neighbour, Daniel - Grace finally learns to live. 1975: Artist Willow Hawkins, and her new husband, Ben, can't believe their luck when an anonymous benefactor leaves them a house on the remote Tasmanian coast. 2004: Libby Andrews has always been sheltered from the truth behind her father Ben's death.

1944, Germany: After years of hiding from the Nazis, Rachel Epstein and her little sister Mindel are captured by the Gestapo and sent to the concentration camp at Bergen-Belsen. The only ray of light for either girl is that they are together. But on arrival, they are separated. As she’s 17 and deemed an adult, Rachel is sent to work in a brutal factory, whilst four-year-old Mindel is sent into the so-called “star” camp for Jewish prisoners. All on her own, Rachel knows her sister will have no chance of survival - unless she can find someone to take care of her.

Austria, 1942: In Mauthausen concentration camp, two prisoners dare to fall in love. When a baby is born–a miracle baby born behind the gates of hell–they vow to escape. Inspired by true events, this powerful World War II novel tells the incredible and inspirational tale of two ordinary people who risk everything to achieve the impossible.

1938, as the world spirals towards war, Klara Koch is employed as Hitler's personal cook. While Germany reveres the image of the Fuhrer, Klara and the household staff are privy to the real Hitler—his secrets, his ailments and his addictions. As Klara observes those circling the Fuhrer, she realises that not all of them are his admirers. Hitler is right to be paranoid. This thoroughly researched and compelling story takes listeners right up close and personal with Hitler as he spirals increasingly out of control in pursuit of his drug-fuelled quest for world domination.

In April 1938, a man calling himself Josef Hofmann arrives at a boarding house in Hamm, Germany, and lets a room from the widow who owns it. Fifty years later, Walter Gersdorff, the widow's son, who was 11 years old in the spring of 1938, discovers the carefully hidden diary the boarder had kept during his stay, even though he should never have written any of its contents down. What Walter finds is a scathing chronicle of one the most tumultuous years in German history, narrated by a secret agent on a deadly mission.

In April 1943 a young woman washes ashore on a deserted beach in Cornwall, England. With shorn hair and a number stitched on her tattered chemise, Alice is the survivor of a ship torpedoed by a German U-boat. She's found by the mysterious Viscount Jack Trewella, who suspects that she's a prisoner of war or a spy. But the secret Alice asks Jack to keep is one he could never have guessed, and it creates an intimate bond he never expected.

May 1940. The Second World War has been waging for eight months and life for Harriet and her family is uncertain. She and her parents make their way back to their homeland for refuge since Guernsey is not seen to have strategic value to Churchill. But, when they get there, they face disaster as the Germans have invaded and taken over their island. Harriet must find a way to survive while her home is overrun.

July 1941. As the war grinds on, Lady Joanna Harcourt knows that her time at Goodwill House is drawing to close. A new chapter awaits, one that she never expected to happen to her – she is going to be a wife and mother again! Excited with their new arrival and with her beloved Flying Officer John Sergeant back in her life, Joanna hopes that even though war clouds gather, love will prevail, and the future will look brighter than ever for the Harcourt family. John has just one last mission to complete, before they can be together.

1923. Among the ancient honey-coloured walls of the tiny island of Malta, strangers slip into the shadows and anyone can buy a new name. Rosalie Delacroix flees Paris for a dancer’s job in the bohemian clubs deep in its winding streets. A sister with a secret 1944. Running from the brutality of war in France, Florence Baudin faces a new life. But her estranged mother makes a desperate request: to find her vanished sister, who went missing years before.

After saving her family farm from falling into disrepair Framboise, a secretive widow, lives a quiet life splitting her time between home and the creperie where she brings her mother's recipes to life. When her nephew approaches her to exploit her family's culinary legacy, Framboise is forced to confront her dramatic childhood at the heart of the German Occupation of France.

The women of Mulberry Lane anxiously wait for news. Peggy doesn’t know if she’ll ever again see Able, the American father of her twins, while a very odd letter from estranged husband, Laurie, threatens to set the cat among the pigeons. Rose can’t stop loving Jimmy, while Tom can’t stop loving her. Will Gordon ever again be the man he once was? Can he be a proper husband to Maureen, and if he can’t, what will become of their marriage?

October 1940. Livvy Redmond is thrilled to receive an invitation to a country house party away from the Blitz. There she hopes to help her husband overcome his injuries from fighting in France. But excitement turns to horror when she stumbles across two members of the house party—murdered.

A two-part radio dramatisation of Vasily Grossman's dark, honest account of the Battle of Stalingrad; a prequel to Life and Fate - plus Stalingrad: Destiny of a Novel. With this astonishing prequel published in its first ever English translation by Richard and Elizabeth Chandler, we are transported back to the very beginning of Vasily Grossman’s panoramic tale, as the ‘harsh whirlwind’ of war approaches the city of Stalingrad.

In the present, Sacha knows the world's in trouble. Her brother, Robert, just is trouble. Their mother and father are having trouble. Meanwhile the world's in meltdown - and the real meltdown hasn't even started yet. In the past, a lovely summer. A different brother and sister know they're living on borrowed time. This is a story about people on the brink of change. They're family, but they think they're strangers. So: where does family begin? And what do people who think they've got nothing in common have in common?

September 1, 1939: Sixty-year-old Janusz Korczak and the students and teachers at his Dom Sierot Jewish orphanage are outside enjoying a beautiful day in Warsaw. Hours later, their lives are altered forever when the Nazis invade. Suddenly treated as an outcast in his own city, Janusz--a respected leader known for his heroism and teaching--is determined to do whatever it takes to protect the children from the horrors to come.

The Empire has vanquished its enemies at last, but at a terrible price. With her chief rival cast into the abyss, Empress Seda must face the truth of what she’s unleashed in her hunger for power. Now the Seal has been shattered, the ancient Worm stirs towards the light for the first time in a thousand years. Already it is striking at the surface, consuming everything in its voracious path. Unchecked, it will ravage the world.

London, December 1943. As the Russian army repels German forces from Stalingrad, Maggie Hope takes a much-needed break from spying to defuse bombs in London. But Maggie herself is an explosion waiting to happen. Traumatized by her past, she finds herself living dangerously - taking huge risks, smoking, drinking, and speeding through the city streets on a motorbike. The last thing she wants is to get entangled in another crime.

It is the summer of 1927 and Hotel Portofino is prospering under Bella’s stewardship. As the season begins, Bella is keenly looking forward to her son Lucian’s imminent arrival and the chance to discuss with him her plans to convert the hotel’s basement into a spa. But then Bella’s husband Cecil turns up unannounced. Over the course of several hot weeks in the middle of the Italian summer, Bella is forced to confront the reality of her relationship with Cecil and to decide to what extent she is prepared to go against social convention to get what she wants.

January 1945, Dachau, Germany. As the train rattles through the bright, snowy Bavarian countryside, the still beauty outside the window hides the terrible scenes inside the train, where men and women are packed together, cold and terrified. Jewish watchmaker Isaac Schüller can’t understand how he came to be here, and is certain he won’t be leaving alive.