Showing results by narrator "Wren" in All Categories

The Path is the story of a group of international travellers who walk the Camino de Santiago, the ancient 800-kilometre pilgrimage from the Pyrenees to the remains of the Apostle Saint James in the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostella in Northern Spain. The group are of all ages, all professions, all religious denominations (and none).

Whilst living in exile on St Helena, Napoleon exerted an extraordinary influence on young Betsy Balcombe. How did she get from Napoleon's side to the Australian bush? Betsy Balcombe as a young woman lived with her family on St Helena. They befriended, served and were ruined by their relationship with Napoleon. To redeem the family's fortunes, William Balcombe, Betsy's father, betrayed Napoleon and accepted a job as the colonial treasurer of NSW, bringing his family with him.

Robert Lyndon, heir apparent to a dukedom and newly spurned lover is desperate to save face amongst the young dandies and court ladies of Regency London society. Handsome, wealthy and decorated for his bravery Robert is recognised as one of the most eligible bachelors in Society. Yet despite his success with the ladies, it seems that he cannot find the perfect wife. Beautiful Rania Temple is living in impoverished gentility in the country. Away from the fashions and trends of the city, she is devoted to her family home and much loved horses.

The beautiful Ariana Dancer is orphaned and has led a cheerless life in London with her disagreeable Guardian, Uncle Konstantin Bardici. He has shown little interest in his niece and she has been left very much to her own devices. One day Uncle Konstantin suggests that Ariana marry an Albanian Prince - one who is seeking an English wife and who claims to have fallen in love with her portrait - and it does not take much to persuade her to agree.

The Marquis and Marquise de Castillon, together with their young son Jean-Pierre, were forced to flee France for England when the French Revolution broke out in 1789. Jean-Pierre was educated at Eton and only returned to Paris when Napoleon came to power. It was not long before he joined Napoleon's Army, survived the Retreat from Moscow and was badly wounded at the Battle of Waterloo. Whilst in hospital, he became friends with Colonel Hubert Dawlish who was in the next bed.

Achingly sensual, effortlessly lyrical, Janette Turner Hospital's dazzling Orpheus Lost is a powerful and disturbing novel. It is both a love story on a grand scale that spans America, Australia and Baghdad, and an examination of what happens to individuals when terrible mistakes are made in the name of 'national security'.

American heiress Lexia and proud Marquis Francis' genuine friendship is tested by jealousy and unexpected rivals in "The Waters of Love". "Wanted - A Royal Wife" sees free-spirited Lady Latasha considering a royal marriage for duty's sake before finding friendship and true love where she least expects it. In "Love at Last", clever Lady Cecilia helps the dashing Prince Ivan search for a bride, never expecting their camaraderie to spark a deep and dangerous love...

The Duke of Norlington and his sister Lady Latasha are living quietly in the country very happily with their horses. The Duke receives a letter from an old Oxford friend who is now His Royal Highness Prince Kraus of Oldessa, a small Principality in the Balkans. The Prince asks the Duke if his sister would consent to marry his brother, Prince Stephan, as she is related to the Royal family, thereby giving Oldessa British protection from the Russians who are vying to take over as many States as they can in the Balkans.

The Marquis of Kexley is just falling asleep beside the beautiful Isobel Heywood, when in a soft voice she suggests that they should be married. Only by pretending to be asleep does he escape answering her and then he realises that because she is a widow, she is extremely dangerous in that she is free for him to marry her. In his other affaires-de-coeur, the women were already married, so he was safe, and he avoided debutantes with ambitious mothers like the plague. Because Isobel is so possessive he thinks it best to leave London at once.

When Lord Rupert Brooke and his wife are killed in an accident, their only child, Titania, was forced to live with her uncle, the Duke of Starbrooke, who had Titania is broken-hearted leaving behind her horse which she adores and her Nanny who is the only person who really loves her. When she reaches Velidos, the King, who is the half-brother of Prince Frederick, finds her in tears and does his best to comfort her.

The beautiful Princess Vasila, an orphan, who has been looked after by Baroness von Bergstein in a Grace and Favour house, is astonished when an Equerry arrives to take her to Windsor Castle to see the Queen. She is not told until she arrives that Prince Gadelov of Saralovia, which is a small Balkan State, has appealed to Queen Victoria to give him a Royal British wife so that he can be protected from the grasping Russians. When the Queen tells Vasila that she is to marry Prince Gadelov immediately, she is horrified and very frightened.

Lady Lolita Vernon, daughter of the late Earl of Walcott and Vernon, has run away. Her stepfather, Ralph Piran, is forcing her to accept the attentions and perhaps an offer of marriage from his business partner, Murdock Tanner, who is very rich but old and repulsive. While she is trying to cover her tracks in London she bumps into a small boy, Simon, who is weeping because he has been beaten cruelly by his stepmother.

What if your perfect life was based on lies? I'm a lucky woman, thinks Susanna Greenfield. And why wouldn't she? Her handsome, successful husband is a loving father to their two teenage children. Her mother, Jean, is her dearest friend. Her scatty but adored younger sister, Angie, seems to have finally found some stability in her life. Susanna has a solid career as an art teacher and if, as she's recently discovered, there's a hole inside her where her creative spirit used to be - is that really such a big price to pay?

On a hot summer’s day in 1880 the beautiful Lady Rosella is cutting a basket of blooms in her beloved Rose Garden at her aunt’s house in Hampshire. It is her seventeenth birthday and no one remembers it except for Thomas, the gardener’s boy. Later she is driven to Winchester and has an unpleasant encounter with two raucous gentlemen in the local tavern before going on to fit her first ball gown that her aunt has given her the money for just before she died. But who is the lovely masked woman she glimpses in the mirror at the dressmakers, a glorious vision clad in rose-pink silk?

After her quiet life in the Highlands of Scotland, the Laird's daughter Ola Mcnewton is looking forward to going to London to take part in Queen Victoria's Jubilee. At first it seemed a good joke to pretend to be a Balkan Princess, and be entertained by the handsome Duke of Cranborne. During one enchanted evening with him, they fell in love. But did the Duke fall in love with her, or the mysterious Balkan Princess.

Italy, 1917. Australian journalist Rebecca Quinn is an unconventional woman. At the height of World War I, she has given up the safety of her Sydney home for the bloody battlefields of Europe, following her journalist husband to the front line as a war correspondent in Italy. Reporting the horrors of the Italian campaign, Rebecca finds herself thrown together with American-born Italian photographer Alessandro Panucci and soon discovers another battleground every bit as dangerous and unpredictable: the human heart.

Viola Brookfield has not a care in the world until the awful day when her parents are tragically killed in a road accident, leaving her all alone in the world. So when her Aunt Mary, Lady Wakefield, writes to invite her to come and live with her in India, Viola decides to accept. But when she arrives, she finds a country fraught with unexpected dangers and that her uncle, Lord Wakefield, behaves as if she is not welcome. Viola's life is further complicated when she meets the handsome but enigmatic Earl of Devonport.

After winning the battle at the underground city, Avery and her soldiers have waged war against Urthmen. But word that the King has dispatched his army changes everything. She and her people must scramble to find a stronghold, a task that's seemingly impossible. And that's not the only challenge facing her group. Betrayal threatens to destroy everything. Will it divide the human alliance before the King's army arrives, or will humanity prevail? Find out in this riveting fourth installment of the Planet Urth series.

Boomtown Los Angeles, 1929: Into a world of movie lots and speakeasies comes Xas, stunt flier and wingless angel, still nursing his broken heart and determined only to go on living in the air. But there are forces that will keep him on the ground. Forces like Conrad Cole, movie director and aircraft designer, a glory-seeking king of the grand splash who is also a man sinking into his own sovereign darkness. And Flora McLeod, film editor and maimed former actress, who sees something in Xas that no one has ever seen before, not even God, who made him, or Lucifer, the general he once followed.

The beautiful Aurora Hartnell has just left her Finishing School in Paris and returns home to Hadleigh Hall. It is Christmas Eve and she hears that an eligible bachelor, Lord Moreton, has moved into nearby Elton Hall. Aurora dreams that he is handsome, tall and exciting - until she meets him and finds that he is none of them. In no time Aurora has received an unwelcome proposal of marriage from Lord Moreton, but he appears to be strangely close to her intimidating stepmother, Lady Hartnell.