Showing results by narrator "Maggie Ollerenshaw" in All Categories

Liverpool, 1915. Martha Rossi lives in a tenement with her husband and their five children. Despite working all the hours she can, the family doesn't have much money. So when Martha’s 14-year-old son, Joe, proudly enlists to fight for his country just to earn his mother an extra shilling, Martha is horrified. Despite her pleas and protests, Joe is dispatched to France within weeks. Unbeknown to them all, Joe’s act of selfless heroism will have huge implications for Martha and all the family.

This collection of narratives from autistic adults is structured around their decades of experience of life, covering 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, 60 and 70s+. These are varied and diverse, spanning different continents, genders, sexualities and ethnicities, yet the author highlights the common themes that unite them and skilfully draws out these threads. Each chapter is based on accounts from one age group and includes accounts from people of that age, giving an insight into the history of autism and signifying how gaining a diagnosis (or not) has changed people's lives over time.

Victoria Macara is 27 and lives alone in the old house on the corner that was once home to the family removal business. When the land is sold, she finds herself surrounded by a small estate of new properties called Victoria Square. The newcomers who move in around her bring with them their own dramas.

When Laura Thyme goes to Baffington to visit her cousin's recently-ordained son, she witnesses a sudden death. A year later, Rosemary and Laura return to help with an ambitious Medieval Fayre, organised by the local celebrity, Franklin Danvers. Their task is to refurbish the neglected churchyard, but on their first morning they discover a body, pierced through the heart with an arrow. Unfortunately, most of the villagers have just received tuition in archery, and several have proved excellent shots!

In the Prince of Wales Hotel and the shabby terraces and tearooms of Westbourne, retired lives run their course - all, in their different ways, anticipating crisis.

After just a year of close, loving marriage, Ruth has been widowed. Her beloved husband, Ben, has been killed in a tragic accident, and Ruth is left suddenly and totally bereft. Unable to share her sorrow and grief with Ben's family, who are dealing with their pain in their own way, Ruth becomes increasingly isolated, burying herself in her cottage in the countryside as the seasons change around her. Only Ben's young brother, Jo, is able to reach out beyond his own grief to offer Ruth the compassion which might reclaim her from her own devastating unhappiness.

Margaret Smith is at the beach. It is a summer day unlike any other Margaret has ever known. The Smith family have left the town where they live and work and go to school and come to a place where the sky is blue, the sand is white, and the sound of the sea surrounds them. An ordinary family discovering the joy of getting away for the first time. Over the course of the coming decades, they will be transformed through their holiday experiences, each new destination a backdrop as the family grows and changes, love stories begin and end -- and secrets are revealed.

The First World War is almost over when nurse Olivia Jones meets dashing American soldier, Tom O'Hagan, and they propose to marry. But Tom is dead by the time Olivia finds herself pregnant. Just hours old, their daughter Ruby is brutally removed from Olivia by her disgusted father and secretly taken to be raised in a convent in north Wales. At fourteen, Ruby is beautiful, intelligent and wilful - and delighted to be chosen by the wealthy Emily Dangerfield, who lives in a grand house near Liverpool, as a companion.

89-year-old Margaret has lived on Garnon Crescent all her life, except for those few years she never talks about. She knows all the neighbours; their hopes, their heartbreaks. Only recently, Margaret's memory isn't what it used to be. She is sure Barbara, her best friend and neighbour, told her something important. Something she was supposed to remember. When Barbara is found dead, Margaret determines to recover her missing memory.

Stumbling upon his dowdy cousin Elinor on the Continent, Theo Ravenhurst hardly believes his luck. His dangerous lifestyle appears to have finally caught up with him, and her family connections could be put to excellent use... Theo is convinced Elinor's drab exterior disguises a fiery, passionate nature. He gives her the adventure she's been yearning for - and along the way discovers she has talents beyond his wildest imagination...

When Joan Bakewell, Labour Peer, author and famous champion of the older people's right to a good and fruitful life, decided that she could no longer remain in her old home, she had to confront what she calls 'the next segment of life'. Disposing of things accumulated during a long life, saying goodbye to her home and the memories of more than fifty years, thinking about what is needed for downsizing - all suddenly became urgent and emotional tasks. And then there was managing family expectations.

In the 17th century, a wall is built around the deer park of a great house. Wychwood is a world in itself, its ornamental lakes and majestic avenues planned by Mr Norris, a master of the new art of landscaping. A world where, after decades of civil war, everyone has something to hide or something to fear, where dissidents hide in the forest and Londoners fleeing the plague are at the gate.

From the foggy streets of Victorian London to the eerie perfection of 1950s suburbia, the everyday is invaded by the evil otherworldly in this unforgettable collection of new ghost stories from the author of The Woman in Black. In the title story, on a murky evening in a warmly lit club off St James, a bishop listens closely as a paranormal detective recounts his most memorable case, one whose horrifying denouement took place in that very building.

It is the heady 60s in Liverpool, and the Flowers, the Baileys, and the McDowds are three very different families bound together by music. The children are determined to be part of the glamour that surrounds the city, so when Sean, Lachlan, and Max form The Merseysiders and Jeannie and Rita become part of The Flower Girls, they put their hearts and souls into achieving success.

In these days of pandemic, war and political turbulence, hope can seem to be in short supply. But hope is one of the theological virtues, and it is far more profound than mere optimism. Teresa White in this Lent Book draws on inspiration from writers as diverse as Julian of Norwich and Karl Rahner, Elizabeth Barrett-Browning and Henri Nouwen, but throughout the audiobook there is strong scriptural underpinning that the author uses to great effect.

Rose has always been close to her father. Her mother died soon after she was born, so it’s been just the two of them for as long as she can remember. But a chance encounter days before she's due to get married leaves Rose questioning everything she has ever known. The man she trusts most in the world has been keeping a secret from her. And the truth will leave her with an impossible choice.

Five immaculate short stories dealing with the tentative-to-frantic strategies of isolated beings distanced from unresponsive societies.

Part social satire, part police procedural, Bill James returns with the stunning prequel to Tip Top - In the drug-ridden Whitsun and Temperate housing estates a connection, once made, is only ever one thing: trouble. Trouble for the journalist whose investigation into the estates leads to his murder; trouble for policewoman Esther Davidson, whose job it is to arrest the killer; and trouble for TV producer Larry Edgehill, who becomes more involved with a Romeo and Juliet-esque cross-estate romance than he ever would have wanted.

A rather mysterious old clergyman is dead, and his daughter, 16-year-old Athene is desolate. A beauty, she is also lonely and living a fantasy life. Athene’s mother dispatches her to spend the holidays with assorted friends and relatives. And for Athene that golden summer after the funeral becomes delicious fodder for her fantasy.

Everyone says 14-year-old Billie is nothing but trouble. A fighter. A danger to her family and friends. But her care worker sees someone different. Her classmate Rob is big, strong; he can take care of himself and his brother. But his violent stepdad sees someone to humiliate. And Chris is struggling at school; he just doesn't want to be there. But his dad sees a useless no-hoper. Billie, Rob and Chris each have a story to tell. But there are two sides to every story, and the question is... who do you believe?