Showing results by narrator "Catrin Walker Booth" in All Categories

Edgewood Rectory may be set in an ancient landscape, but the Grantly family are very much of their time. Caught up in the uncertain world that has emerged since the outbreak of peace, the Rector and Mrs Grantly are bewildered by the challenges facing their eldest children: Eleanor, longing for more excitement than can be found in the Red Cross Library; and Tom, struggling to readjust to student life at Oxford after his military service.

Sid Jones has always known she is different, but after accidentally freeing a 300-year-old pirate ghost (using a gel pen and a chocolate bar), Sid realises that she has actual MAGIC! Sid starts to use her magic to free more ghosts, who have all been trapped by the sinister innkeeper. But then a mysterious sickness strikes the people of Fathom. Can Sid and best friend Zen solve the mystery, save the town and free the ghosts?

You will find a bothy in the mountains or the wilderness, remote huts you can’t reserve, usually without electricity or other mod-cons, running water or a marker on the map. And it’s there that you’ll meet Kat Hill – kettle on, feet up and pen out. Leading us on a gorgeous journey around the UK, Kat reveals the history of these wild mountain shelters and the people who visit them. With an historian’s insight and a rambler’s imagination, Kat lends fresh consideration to the concepts of nature, wilderness and escape.

Sid Jones loves hanging out in the graveyard with her best friend Zen—they are desperate to see a real-life ghost! But when Sid accidentally summons a 300-year-old pirate from the dead, it opens the door to the HALFWAY HOUSE—a magical inn FULL of lost souls from across the ages, all trapped there by a sinister landlord. There are more ghosts that Sid could ever have imagined—and they’re all sure Sid is there to save them! (Sid’s sure there’s been some kind of mistake.)

This stunning novel tells the true story of the woman behind one of the world’s greatest artists, Vincent Van Gogh. In 1890, Vincent Van Gogh dies penniless, unknown, a man tortured by his own mind. Eleven years later his work is exhibited in Paris and his unparalleled talent finally recognised. The tireless efforts of one woman gave the world one of its greatest creative minds. But twenty-eight-year-old Johanna Van Gogh-Bonger, Vincent’s sister-in-law and the keeper of his immense collection of paintings, sketches and letters, has, until now, been written out of history.

How do we give a voice to those who so often remain unheard? Will You Read This, Please is a frank and impactful collection of twelve stories as told to our best British writers, based on the lived experience of people who have faced mental illness in the UK. Edited by Joanna Cannon, the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Trouble with Goats and Sheep, Three Things About Elsie and A Tidy Ending, the stories told here are powerful, resonant and heart-breaking. This is a ground-breaking and unforgettable collection, shining a light on the stigma and isolation of living with mental illness.

Innocent Phoebe has only known a life of privilege. Street-smart Paula has had to make her own way in the world. When the two girls meet as teenagers, they form a deep sisterly bond, recognising in one other a yearning for love and for lives that are different from the ones into which they were born. But when they each suffer a personal trauma, they are torn apart and set out on very different paths.

After narrowly avoiding the end of the world, the leaders of Heaven and Hell are struggling to collaborate according to the terms of their new treaty - especially because angels and demons are, quite literally, allergic to each other. Seeking a solution, the powers that be decide to see if the allergy persists on Earth by sending an angel and demon on a research trip, first stop: New York City. And what better chaperone than Dr Greta Helsing, who happens to owe Hell a few favours of her own?

Atia is an immortal who feeds on fear and nightmare. As the last of her kind, she hides in the shadows of the world to escape the wrath of the vengeful Gods. Silas is a Herald, carrying messages and ferrying the dead, as punishment for a past he can't remember. Atia would never dream of allying with someone like him, but when she breaks a sacred law and the gods send monsters to hunt her, Silas offers an irresistible deal: he'll help her take on the Gods and get vengeance for her family. But in return, she must help him break the curse that binds him and restore his humanity.

Cornwall, 1786. For years, the villagers of Mirecoombe have turned to their Keeper, the old and battle-scarred Lord Pelagius Hunt, mediator between the worlds of men and fey, for help. But this is a time of change. Belief in the old ways, in the piskies and spriggans, has dimmed, kindled instead in the Reverend Cleaver's fiery pulpit. His church stands proud above the mire; God's name is whispered, hushed, loved. And now, death stalks Mirecoombe on the moor. There are corpses in the heather. There is blood in the gorse.

It's the summer of 1947, and peacetime has brought new challenges to Barsetshire. Beliers Priory, once a military hospital during the War, has now become a flourishing preparatory school for boys run by Leslie and Philip Winter. When Charles Belton is hired as the new school master, six young people are thrown together in a web of flirtations and misunderstandings: Charles and his elder brother, Naval Captain Freddy Belton; Susan Dean, now Red Cross Depot Librarian, and her glamorous sister Jessica, an actress in thrall to the theatre; pragmatic Lucy Marling and her brother Oliver.

Sam and Daisy have been best friends since university. Back then Daisy was a wild, Fleetwood Mac-obsessed girl descended from the Yorkshire Moors, while Sam’s youth was misspent traipsing around Liverpool on shopping trips and nights out. But as they lean against each other on a wooden bench in the tired garden of their beloved local pub, gazing out at Sam’s wedding, they have no idea that their paths are about to truly diverge for the first time.

Emily has worked hard to be the chic city girl she always dreamed of being. She's definitely not still thinking about Andy, her last boyfriend who ghosted her completely out of the blue. She's got her eyes on the new guy at work. He's much better suited to her new image. When a séance goes haywire, Andy barges back into her life, switching off lights, moving through furniture and moaning about his untimely death. He didn't ghost her, he died...and he's a bit miffed she's trying to move on. And if Emily is going to stop Andy's ghost ruining her love life, she's got to get rid of him.

When a barrow-wight shows up on Greta and Varney's doorstep one night with an 11-year-old girl who's been newly - and forcefully - bitten and turned, it's up to Greta and her vampiric friends to find out who did this to her, and why.

Evelyn Seaton’s life is ruined when her father squanders her family’s fortune. Secretly answering an advertisement for an assistant at the dusty and forgotten Lamplighter’s Bookshop in York, Evelyn meets the enigmatic and prickly William Morton, an aspiring writer hiding secrets of his own. But when her predicament is intensified by the spiteful Lady Violet, who is determined to twist the knife on Evelyn’s misfortune, she has nowhere to turn. Evelyn and William are too scared to trust each other — can they turn the page on their story and find the courage to write the next chapter?

As the sun sets on a feverishly hot July evening, a young woman spies on her teenage neighbour, transfixed by what looks like an occult ritual intended to banish an ex-boyfriend. Alone in a new town and desperate to expel the claustrophobic memories of her own ex that have followed, the narrator decides to try to hex herself free from her past. She falls in with the neighbour and her witchy friend, exploring nascent supernatural powers as the boundaries of reality shift in and out of focus.

Merryn Rowe adores her life in St Ives. The café she owns and the community she serves are her much-needed second chance after a heart-breaking divorce. But as she gazes out at the Cornish Sea, she begins to long for more. Zach Trevelyan is not where he expected to be. His surfing career in tatters following an injury, he finds himself in St Ives without a home, a job, or a path ahead. When Merryn discovers an abandoned piano, it evokes long-lost memories of someone who left her life without a word – her much-loved stepfather.

Change is in the air in Barsetshire. The country may have a new queen, but Greshambury has a new rector, Canon Fewling, and a returned prodigal daughter: the beautiful, frivolous Rose Fairweather. But for lonely Margot Phelps, caring for her elderly parents in Jutland Cottage, the future holds little promise - until a group of benevolent neighbours, led by Rose, decide to take her under their wing. With a new tweed suit, a little kindness, and not one, but three, potential suitors, could happiness be around the corner at last?

In 1824, Lyme Regis is as tumultuous as the sea that surrounds it. When twenty-four-year-old Ada Winters - poor, peculiar and brilliant - uncovers a set of unusual fossils on the cliffs, she believes she has found the answer to her scientific frustrations and her family's financial struggles. Meanwhile, Doctor Edwin Moyle has come to Dorset in search of the discovery that will place him amongst the greatest geologists of the age. What he finds instead is a strange young woman who seems to hold the key to everything he desires.

Hedoné House, a luxurious sanatorium for the creative elite dedicated to the groundbreaking treatment of tuberculosis. As the doctor’s new wife, Agnes Templeton has pledged her life to a house of fever. Her husband’s methods are unusual. There are whisperings about past patients and even a cure. Hedoné’s secrets draw Agnes in, revealing truths she could never anticipate, and soon she is caught between a past she is desperate to escape and a future she may forever regret.