Showing results by narrator "Anna Cordell" in All Categories

Enid Elliot Linder was the daughter of a butler and a lady’s maid in service in some of England’s grandest country houses. Evoking the lost world of a childhood ‘below stairs’, Linder’s touching memoir describes how her life changed as Britain headed towards war. After the family moved to a Marylebone tenement, her father sought work in London restaurants whilst battling personal demons. Meanwhile Linder’s aunt was nanny to a high-ranking member of the British Union of Fascists as they grew in influence.

Can she save her family and her name from destruction? As financial troubles wrack the Killigrew household, the passion and strength of the man Morwen loved so dearly ebb away. Into this turbulent landscape arrives a dynamic stranger from America. Randell Wainwright is determined to forge a stronger bond with one particular person - Morwen. As old hurts are renewed, bitter family quarrels rage and blackmail and tragedy threaten the foundation of her home, Morwen struggles to save her name and her family from destruction.

When Morwen Tremayne read her vows to Ben Killigrew, now master of the greatest clay works in Cornwall, she swore to stay by his side until death parted them. Had she known how closely she would have to hold to those words, she would still have sworn them a thousand times and with all her heart....

Maddy Shillabeer’s prospects are limited. As the only woman in a household of men, in a town with precious few romantic possibilities, she’s resigned herself to a life of familial duty. That is, until the arrival of mysterious stranger Patrick Howard. It’s clear Patrick has seen a world Maddy can only imagine, and she’s awed by his charm and beguiling tongue. In no time at all Patrick has skillfully climbed the social pecking order in Duncannon...and worked his way into Maddy Shillabeer’s heart.

Hardly out of childhood, Amy Kennedy and fellow orphans Seth, Jay and Daisy are sent from the Lambeth Workhouse in London to the Devon port of Brixham to be taken into service, the girls as maidservants, the boys as apprentices on a trawler. Although her initiation into her job is hard, Amy quickly finds her feet, and shortly her horizons are brightened by an attentive young man, Daniel Newton, the son of a prosperous sea captain.

A poignant, Edwardian family saga set in a hotel business in Torquay. When laundress Mercy Seaton’s chance meeting with Peter Lisburne at the annual Torquay regatta leads to a whirlwind proposal, she’s swept into her husband’s glittering world at ‘I do’. But all that glitters is not gold, and Mercy’s discomfort in the drawing rooms of Edwardian society leave her adrift in a world she’s ill prepared for. Combined with the onset of war, Mercy’s life becomes an ever-changing landscape of uncertainty.

Zofia's son, Janek, has vanished without a trace. Leaving behind her native Warsaw, she arrives in London, determined to uncover the truth - and she's certain that a celebrated writer called Steve holds the key to Janek's disappearance. To fund her DIY investigation, Zofia takes on a string of cleaning jobs - a professional trajectory she finds very much beneath her. Armed with little more than her stubborn resolve and a second-hand detective manual, Zofia gathers evidence.

Stella’s life hasn’t quite gone to plan. She imagined that, at forty, she’d be settled with a supportive husband, two kids and a dog. Instead, she’s single and living at home with her mum, Bonnie, and grandmother, Florence. She passes the evenings in her childhood bedroom, obsessively searching for the perfect sperm donor. Unbeknownst to Stella is that Bonnie and Florence both also had difficult journeys to motherhood. And now that they’re writing down their stories for Stella’s unborn child, the truth about their family is becoming harder to conceal.

Michelle will never get tired of the view from her office window. Jagged mountains—and the wintry streets of Reykjavik, Iceland. It's a perk of her new job at Kimia Pharmaceuticals. Her old life—a dreary 9-to-5 and a cheating ex back in London—already feels a million miles away. Still, there's something strange about Michelle's new colleagues. They're all young, beautiful . . . and aloof. But then Michelle meets Lars, a jittery researcher from the restricted upper floors. She thinks she's alone in the elevator, until he squeezes between the doors. Just in time.

The land, sea and skyscapes of the UK are constantly shifting. Species, landmarks and ways of life slip in and out of existence, and firm ground is often just out of reach. Weaving together stories drawn from literature, local history and her own family heritage, Oxford professor Fiona Stafford leads us along coastlines and through forests and fens, revealing the forces, both natural and human, which leave places unrecognisably changed.

The Number 1 International Bestseller. The heartbreaking, inspiring true story of a girl sent to Auschwitz who survived Mengele’s evil experiments. With a foreword written by His Holiness Pope Francis. Lidia was just three years old when she arrived in Auschwitz-Birkenau with her mother...