Showing results by narrator "Imogen Church" in All Categories

Kate is not in a meaningful relationship but dreams of being a parent and pouring all her love into the tiny bundle of happiness that will her love unconditionally in return. Except without any partner on the horizon before her ovaries retire, Kate decides to take matters into her own hands and have one anyway. No one thinks this is a good idea, not her best friend, or her boss at the bookshop where she works—not even June, one of her elderly customers. Because what they can see, and what Kate can’t, is that it isn’t a baby that she needs at all—it’s something else entirely.

Amber is happy. She loves her husband, David, and their dog, Sadie; she even loves her job as a junior editor on a local newspaper. But when the body of a young woman is found in a stretch of river near her home, Amber’s world begins to implode. The headaches that she has been struggling with seem to intensify, and Amber begins to doubt her husband. Why doesn’t he want to probe deeper into the story, and why does she seem to have such a shaky hold on her own thoughts and memories?

She got her happily ever after. What came next? If she tries very hard, Ami can remember when she used to have a dynamic and exciting career and a husband who she loved more than life itself, and who was equally smitten with her... Now she has two children, a terrifyingly large mortgage, and no idea who she has become – or why she and her husband can't even be in the same room anymore. With life as she knew it in tatters around her, Ami is heartbroken, and in no way pulling off 'consciously uncoupling' like a celeb.

Your best friend deserves the truth. But it will ruin her life. What would you do? It’s been over twenty years since four very different teenage girls sat on that beach at Goran Haven, and swore to be best friends forever. Their lives went different ways after Emily left. But each remembered that promise. And none truly found friendship like it again. Now, Emily’s back, with a secret she can’t face. She tries to hide away, take time to heal and make some difficult choices, but she runs into one of her old friends, and soon the four are reunited.

An amateur autistic sleuth. A wry English detective. A murder case that thrusts them both into the wealthy world of the rare artifacts trade… Jo Jones can't seem to catch a break. Trading in city life for the cozy, peaceful hills of the English countryside to take over her family estate should have been a chance for a “fresh start.” Instead, she's been driven further into the past than she thought possible—and not just her own. The estate is littered with traces of ancestors that Jo never knew existed, including a mysterious woman depicted in a half-destroyed painting.

Under Cancún’s hard blue sky, a beach boy provides a canvas for tourists’ desires, seeing deep into the world’s underbelly. An enigmatic encounter in Copenhagen takes an IT consultant down a rabbit hole of speculation that proves more seductive than sex. The collapse of a love triangle in London leads to a dangerous, hypnotic addiction. In the Nevada desert, a grieving man tries to merge with an unearthly machine.

When Jess and Rupert parted ways, it was the end of a great love story that might have been. Now, 10 years later, the very different paths they have taken in life will bring them back together for a chance meeting. But with so much left unsaid about the break-up neither ever recovered from and with each keeping their own devastating secrets, will they finally be able to make the fractured pieces of their love for one another whole again?

I’m a psychologist. Dr Emy Rose. Although that’s not my real name. I run a pioneering new government project, persuading convicted murderers to give up their secrets – namely, the resting places of their victims. The work I do is gruelling: one-to-one interrogations, conducted over months, with some of the most despicable people on the planet. But it’s about getting answers for the families. And – this part’s a secret – I know better than most how much that means…And nobody else knows how far I am willing to go, to get a murderer to confess.

Eleanor, Richard and their two young daughters recently stretched themselves to the limit to buy their dream home, a four-bedroom Victorian townhouse in East London. But the cracks are already starting to show. Eleanor is unnerved by the eerie atmosphere in the house and becomes convinced it is making her ill. Whilst Richard remains preoccupied with Zoe, their mercurial 27-year-old lodger, Eleanor becomes determined to unravel the mystery of the house's previous owners....

'This was where her dreams drifted to if she didn't blot her nights out with drink; this was where her thoughts settled if she didn't fill her days with chat. She remembered this tiny, remote foreign village on a molecular level and the sight of it soaked into her like water into sand, because this was where her old life had ended and her new one had begun.'

Growing up the middle child of transatlantic parents, Bella Pollen never quite learnt how to belong. Restlessly crisscrossing the boundaries of family and freedom, safety and danger, home and away, she has sought but generally failed to contain an adventurous spirit within the narrow lines of convention - until, finding herself stymied in the in-between, she reluctantly concludes that to move forwards, she must take a good look at her past.

It’s no surprise to anyone that Jeffrey Sachs, billionaire CEO of his own hotel chain, has a drop-dead gorgeous Estonian mistress. But stepping down to spend his retirement years with her? No one saw that coming - least of all his wife! So now the prize of becoming Sachs CEO is up for grabs - and Jeffrey’s four children have until the day of his wedding to compete for the job. In a game where the ultimate prize is power beyond your wildest dreams, you should never underestimate your competitors, even if they are family.... And, it turns out, twins can be the most dangerous rivals of all....

Ghost stories became hugely popular during the 19th century, and the Victorians became the masters of the genre. This deliciously chilling collection of Classic Hallowe'en Stories includes authors such as Charles Dickens, Edith Wharton, Edgar Allen Poe, Elizabeth Gaskell, Henry James, Bram Stoker, H. P. Lovecraft, Algernon Blackwood, Arthur Machen, M. R. James and Vernon Lee.

The last thing she remembers is standing outside the empty house. One she was employed to pack, ready for removal. Her job is her life. It is her compulsion to take care of an owner’s precious possessions, to do whatever it takes to help them move on. Now she is cold, dirty, damp, trapped in its cellar with no chance of escape, miles from anywhere. His prisoner.

It’s not the first time Laurel Nightingale has found a dead body, but this one - discovered alone in a locked room with a dagger in his back - was a journalist staying in the village of Elderwick for the purpose of profiling famous author Hugh Quintrell. Hugh is her latest client at her small psychology practice, not to mention her number one suspect. Hugh's determined to use his skills to help the police, but for Laurel it's a huge conflict of interest. She ditches Hugh and starts her own sleuthing.

When an archaeology dig uncovers a skeleton, Dr Laurel Nightingale finds herself drawn into another grisly mystery. The bones aren't ancient as everyone hoped, and the police confirm a killer is on the loose. Laurel, alongside her spirited best friend Maggie and history buff Albert, dives into the village's tangled web of secrets and lies. As they dig deeper, a local student winds up dead under mysterious circumstances, a charming police officer turns into an unexpected ally, and suspicion spreads through the village like wildfire.

On a hot July day, three elderly people are found dead in a dilapidated house in Primrose Hill. Reading the story in a newspaper as she prepares to leave the country, Marie Gillies has an unshakable feeling that she is somehow to blame. How did these three people come to live together, and how did they all die at once? The truth lies in a very different England and in the secret world of the ladies of the house....

Laurel Nightingale wants to start again. However, after discovering a dead body shortly after arriving in the tight-knit community, she wonders if village life is as wholesome as she first thought. . . Local police are convinced the death was accidental, but Laurel suspects murder, and enlists new friend Maggie to join her quest in uncovering the truth. When a second body is found, Laurel ruffles feathers by pointing the finger at one of the locals. But, when her accusation backfires, she's left alienated and afraid.

Kate is on the run with her daughter Heather, her identity hidden and their destination unknown to the family they've left behind. She's found a place where they can live in solitude, a grand old house full of empty rooms and dark secrets. But they're not alone: in the cottage next door live two strange older ladies, sisters Matty and Sissy. They know what happened here long ago, and are curious about Kate. How long can she hide Heather's presence from them?

In this entertaining collection, dogs of all kinds are brought to life. Working dogs, dogs who are mistreated by humans, dogs who save lives and the ones that make us laugh; they all leap and bound in stories by our most accomplished writers, including Mark Twain, Virginia Woolf, Jack London and Jerome K. Jerome.