Showing results by narrator "Penelope Rawlins" in All Categories

When Lucy Brennan, a Miami Beach personal fitness trainer, disarms a gunman chasing two frightened homeless men, the police and the breaking-news cameras are not far behind and, within hours, Lucy is a media hero. The solitary eye-witness is the depressed and overweight Lena Sorensen, who becomes obsessed with Lucy and signs up as her client - though she seems more interested in the trainer’s body than her own. When the two women find themselves more closely aligned, and can’t stop thinking about the sex lives of Siamese twins, the real problems start....

Tamsin recently married renowned composer Robin Featherstone. Robin is much older, but Tamsin doesn’t care—she’s in love. And she knows Robin loves her too, even if he is very close to another young woman—his assistant, Mia. Meanwhile, Robin’s ex-wife and grown children aren’t happy—they’re sure Tamsin is a gold-digger and Mia is an opportunist. Then, when Robin suddenly dies, the family’s worst fears are realized: Tamsin stands to inherit everything. But when the will is read, its contents are beyond shocking.

Sky Mundy's life has changed dramatically since she fled the underground compound where she grew up. She and her friends are now prey to dinosaurs and being pursued by marines, but Sky is determined to follow a map left by her missing father. When the map leads to a hidden underwater lab, Sky is horrified to learn that scientists are still breeding dinosaurs. As she delves deeper into her father's secrets, Sky uncovers a plan that will destroy the world, unless she can put a stop to it....

Sarah Yates is a thirty-something history teacher, divorced, disillusioned and desperate to have more excitement in her life. Then one evening the doorbell rings and the handsome and mysterious John Needler brings more excitement than Sarah could ever have imagined. John wants Sarah to go back in time trying to make sure people find their happy endings. The question is, will she ever be able to find hers?

As word of Horus's treachery spreads to fully half of the Legiones Astartes, Terra looks to the remaining loyalist Space Marines to defend the Imperium. One group, however, remains curiously silent in spite of apparent efforts from both sides to contact them—the storied V Legion, Jaghatai Khan's fearsome White Scars. In the ork-held territory of Chondax, a bitter war has been raging since the Triumph at Ullanor, and only now do the sons of Chogoris return their gaze to the heavens.

Dimpson McCabe - Dimpsie - has invited his closest friends of the theatre world to join him for Christmas at his castle on a private island some hours' drive from Edinburgh. The festivities have barely begun when Dimpsie is found draped atop the Christmas tree, electrocuted by the lights. It's labelled Accidental Death, but in the swirling snow suspicion is dancing among the flakes. The dogged Inspector Smith begins to circle, seeking to find the leading man or prima donna responsible.

DEATH AT FRANCIS COURT NOW CONFIRMED AS MURDER! Speculation is rife that the victim, estate manager Alex Sterling (44), was found by Lady Beatrice (35), the Countess of Rossex, niece of King James. Lady Beatrice, who has finally come out of hiding following her son's departure to boarding school, has been managing the project to refurbish and redesign the Events Suite at Francis Court, alongside Perry Juke.

A brave, tender novel about who we want to be...and who we really are. Cambridge, 1963. Charlotte is struggling. With motherhood, with the changes marriage and parenthood bring, with losing the time and the energy to paint. Her husband, Henry, wants things to be as they were and can’t face the thought of another English winter. A brochure slipped through the letterbox gives him the answer:

Fell is the Hand of Darkness, a relic of great evil. Seeking to rob the powers of Chaos of this relic and bend fate to the favour of order, Yvraine of the Ynnari and the mysterious yet deadly Visarch lead a host of Aeldari on a quest to steal it. To reach it, however, they must first beseech the aid of the Black Library. Only then will Yvraine and her warriors have even the slightest chance to slip through the Garden of Nurgle and from there to the Plague Planet and the Whispering Tower of Mortarion, where the Hand of Darkness surely resides.

"I saw the strangest sight tonight." New Bohemia. America. A storm. A black man finds a white baby abandoned in the night. He gathers her up - light as a star - and decides to take her home. London. England. After the financial crash. Leo Kaiser knows how to make money, but he doesn't know how to manage the jealousy he feels towards his best friend and his wife. Is his newborn baby even his?

Two quirky and hilarious stories from the best-selling Diana Wynne Jones. Two groups of children learn that while you can choose your friends, dealing with your family can make you wish you could choose a different one….

Lovely but penniless Harriet Metcalf is horrified when she is named in a nobleman's will as guardian of his two ghastly and snobbish twin daughters. The innocent Harriet doesn't feel wily enough to cope with the intricacies of the London Season - not to mention two of its most eligible bachelors, the Marquis of Huntington and Lord Vere.

Police Officer Jemima Cotton expected Little Cote to be a quieter pace of life. But, unlike London, everyone knows everyone, and beyond the cake sales and coffee mornings, tea parties and village fetes, the neighbours aren't all the best of friends. When Jemima is unpacking her mugs and teabags in her new home on Foxglove Close, she's called to attend her first murder investigation. She's excited, until she discovers it's only a few doors down from her. And she hasn't even met her new neighbours yet.

As dawn breaks over the Pont Neuf, and the cobbled alleyways of Paris come to life, Anna Trent is already awake and at work; mixing and stirring the finest, smoothest, richest chocolate; made entirely by hand, it is sold to the grandes dames of Paris. It's a huge shift from the chocolate factory she worked in at home in the north of England. But when an accident changed everything, Anna was thrown back in touch with her French teacher, Claire

Ever dreamed of starting over? Issy Randall can bake. No, more than that - Issy can create stunning, mouth-wateringly divine cakes. After a childhood spent in her beloved Grampa Joe’s bakery she has undoubtedly inherited his talent. So when she’s made redundant from her safe but dull City job, Issy decides to seize the moment and open up her own café. It should be a piece of cake, right?

England, 1932: Grace Hamblin, the beekeeper's daughter, knows her place and her future, until her father dies. She’s alone, except for one man who she just can't shake from her thoughts…. Massachusetts, 1973: Grace's daughter Trixie Valentine is in love. But when he has to go home to England, he promises to come back, if she will wait for him. Both mother and daughter are searching for love and happiness, unaware of the secrets that bind them.

When a young couple buy their first home in Little Cote, they're so excited to make it their own. The house has been up for sale for months, and it is idyllic on the outside but needs a complete overhaul on the inside. However, while the garden is overrun with meets, the house is falling down, there's a horrid concrete patio that, while ugly, looks absolutely brand-new. The couple hate it, and seeing as they're doing the house from top to bottom, they decide to rip the concrete up, too. When two bodies are discovered under the patio, Jemima Cotton is the first on the scene.

After PC Jemima's Cotton's first murder investigation, she knows now to trust no one. She leaves the gifted lasagnes uneaten in her freezer and won't go near a cake sale. But when Perry Noble, head of the Little Cote darts club, is found dead on his doorstep, even PC Cotton can't believe she's found herself involved in yet another murder investigation in this sleepy village. As Jemima starts to investigate, she discovers Perry had his fair share of enemies...especially among the darts players themselves. So it's no surprise when the murder weapon is revealed to be a poisoned dart.

Charlie Hunter does not like Christmas, especially the lead into it—cooking endless servings of Christmas dinner. So when she is asked by Graeme Strickland, Michelin-starred chef, egomaniac and friend, to help out in a hotel restaurant in Edinburgh’s New Town, for a fortnight, she accepts with alacrity. The Head Chef, David Jenkins, is a very old friend of Strickland’s, and the job entails covering temporarily for a sous chef position, while Strickland provides cover for Charlie, gratis, in the Old Forge Café.

While her starfaring people are being hunted by an implacable enemy, a young caver discovers a traitor in their ranks and must undertake a transformative journey across the galaxy to save everything she has ever known. Persecuted for their worship of the Endless—an ancient, galactic-spanning race of god-like power, who disappeared long ago—the Pilgrims escaped the world of Raia almost a century ago, fleeing the despotic rule of the United Empire in a dozen space-faring fleets.