Showing results by narrator "Gemma Dawson" in All Categories

Joanna Rowntree thinks she will die of a broken heart when her one true love marries another - until not one but two fascinating newcomers appear on neighboring estates. As the roughhewn Jonathan Erland and the polished Sir Rollin Denby engage in a heated competition for her hand, Joanna realizes her heart is alive and well - but to whom will she give it?

Anna Karenina is one of the most nuanced characters in world literature, and we return to her and the novel she propels again and again. Remarkably, there has not yet been an examination of Leo Tolstoy specifically through the lens of this novel. Critic and Professor Bob Blaisdell unravels Tolstoy’s family, literary, and day-to-day life during the period that he conceived, drafted, abandoned, and revised Anna Karenina. In the process, we see where Tolstoy’s life and his art intersect in obvious and unobvious ways.

Freya Bauer's revolutionary fervor has dimmed with age, but just as she's about to hang up her DedSec mask, she's recruited for one last mission to Berlin . . . with her ex-husband of all people. Yet upon her arrival in Germany, a series of betrayals mean she's suddenly unable to distinguish between friends and foes. Meanwhile, Freya's past has caught up with her—in the form of a mysterious hitman determined to take out the Bauer family in London. 

Duping unwary nobleman out of their fortunes in the gaming halls - a dangerous game she plays in order to raise money to avenge her father's death - Judith Davenport finds herself under the scrutiny of the honorable Marquis of Carrington.

Sophie's new flatmate seems like a perfect fit until small things start to feel off in this fast-paced thriller where obsession turns deadly.

After 17-year-old Felicita’s dearest friend Ilven kills herself to escape an arranged marriage, Felicita chooses freedom over privilege. She fakes her own death and leaves her sheltered life as one of Pelimburg’s magical elite behind. Living in the slums, scrubbing dishes for a living, she falls for charismatic Dash while also becoming fascinated with the vampire, Jannik. Then something shocking washes up on the beach: Ilven's death has called out of the sea a dangerous wild magic.

Fear was the unacknowledged specter haunting the streets of London during the Second World War; fear not only of death from the German bombers circling above, but of violence at the hands of fellow Londoners in the streets below. Mass displacement, the anonymity of shelters, and the bomb-scarred landscape offered unprecedented opportunities for violent crime. In this absorbing, sometimes shocking account, Amy Helen Bell uncovers the hidden stories of murder and violence that were rife in wartime London.

A princess who has lost her mother and father finds herself in a terrifying world that urgently needs a queen in this thrilling fantasy novel. Sophia is smart, beautiful, and accomplished, a beloved princess devoted to the people and to reading books. The kingdom is hers, until she is plunged...

Newlywed, Rhianwyn Mulryan is blissfully happy. But a magical pact she made with three close friends foretells the impending end of her enchanted life. Over the next year, as the seasons change, the women will exchange lives. With the first transformation, Rhianwyn will experience her friend Selena's life as a harlot where she'll need to fend off the cruel brothel owner and evade a mysterious murderer. Worse still, until she's herself again, Rhianwyn must battle the powerful attraction to her husband, Broccan—or risk destroying everything she loves most.

Quarry Lake, twelve years ago: Three young women are attacked, all with long, dark hair. The attacker wears a yellow jacket. One is murdered; one is left in a coma; one escapes; a small town lives in fear.

When Frankie’s mother dies, he tells his teacher. But he can't seem to get anyone at his school in southern England to listen to him. So the six-year-old comes up with a plan: go to France, find a police station and ask the officers to ring his father. Thus a stowaway’s view of the sea opens Pauline Holdstock’s eighth novel, narrated in turns by Frankie - who likes cheese, numbers, the sea when it’s pink, and being alone when he feels bad - and a cast of characters that includes his worried Gran, his callous teacher and his not-so-reliable father.

Battling a demon lord is all in a day's work for the Dark One named Sebastian. But now he must take on a horde of unhappy zombies and an obnoxious teen vampire if he wants to win the hand of the one woman who can make him whole. Ysabelle is a woman with a past, and not a whole lot of future if a certain demon lord has his way. With zombies, demons, and a little thing like death standing in her way, will she find happiness in the man who's seen more darkness than she can imagine?

Now Alice has become a member of the clandestine Collectors' Society, and the impossible has found her again in the form of an elusive villain set on erasing entire worlds. As she and the rest of the Society race to bring this mysterious murderer to justice, the fight becomes painfully personal. Lives are being lost. Loved ones are shattered or irrevocably altered. Each step closer Alice gets to the shadowy man she hunts, the more secrets she unravels, only to reveal chilling truths.

For most of her life, Juliet Emerline has subsisted, isolated by deafness, making hats in the solitude of her home. Now she's at risk of losing her sanctuary to Lord Nicolas Thornton, a mysterious and eccentric architect with designs on her humble estate. When she secretly witnesses him raging beside a grave, Juliet investigates, finding the name "Hawk" on the headstone and an unusual flower at the base. The moment Juliet touches the petals, a young English nobleman appears in ghostly form.

Meet Britain's worst innkeeper. Single mother and extremely undomestic goddess Lottie has five days to become the ultimate B&B hostess to save her beloved Aunt Kate’s livelihood. When Aunt Kate ends up in the hospital, Lottie and her seven-year-old daughter are called to rural Wales to stand in at the B&B. Without the faintest idea how to run a hotel (she can barely run her own life), Lottie must impress the picky hotel reviewer and his dysfunctional family who are coming to stay over Christmas.

The moment the car hit her, everything changed for Charlotte Roach. Out on a training ride with other Olympic hopefuls, elite athletes all of them, Charlotte was just 21 years old, with the dream of making the GB triathlon team. Now, as she lay on the tarmac with a broken back, waiting for the air ambulance, she was drifting in and out of consciousness, fighting for her life. Nearly two years later, Charlotte sat on her bike in China, waiting for the sun to rise. Ahead of her was a journey that would span 10,000 kilometers.

In the aftermath of Morgan le Fay’s war on Camelot, the once-great kingdom struggles to rebuild. Vivienne, Merlin's former apprentice, toils in secret day and night on orders from the Lady of the Lake to build an aeroship. The Lady has seen the future and promises that the ship will ensure Camelot’s knights triumph over the Black Knight in the quest for Avalon and the Holy Grail. But when a company of knights goes missing - including Owen, Vivienne’s brother; and Marcus, her beloved - Vivienne changes the plan.

Seventeen-year-old Vivienne lives in a world of knights and ladies, corsets and absinthe, outlaw magic and alchemical machines. By day, she is lady-in-waiting to the future queen of Camelot - Guinevere. By night, she secretly toils away in the clock tower as apprentice to Merlin, the infamous recovering magic addict. Then she meets Marcus, below her in class, destined to become a knight, and just as forbidden as her apprenticeship with Merlin.

Unpredictable travel and runaway dresses create a race against the clock. Will Molly find love at the finish line? Molly Wright is in Paris, in a romantic restaurant, with the moonlight dancing over La Seine, sitting her long term boyfriend Reggie…hoping he doesn't propose! She's not sure they want the same things anymore - he wants the big time, all she wants to do is design clothes. Molly gets her wish: Reggie doesn't propose. Instead, he breaks up with her!

From the incomparable Jane Feather, author of national best sellers Vanity, Violet, and Valentine, comes this enthralling new romance of daring deception and forbidden passion...Juliana drew the line at becoming a harlot. She had already begun the week as a bride...and ended it as a murderess.