Showing results by narrator "Emily Pennant Rea" in All Categories

Ceylon, 1906: Stella Polegate steps off the ship in Colombo harbour, her heart beating with contradictory emotions. As her father’s unofficial research assistant, she’s thrilled to explore this island of ancient temples and verdant tea plantations—yet painfully aware that her brilliant mind will remain uncredited, her academic ambitions dismissed simply because she is a woman.

When her father dies, Rosie returns to Warbury House after decades away. To secure her share of the fortune, she must endure seven days with her estranged siblings, Hettie and James. But the sprawling estate holds more than money – it guards the truth about her brother’s tragic death. As old wounds reopen, Rosie realises silence won't protect her anymore. With millions at stake and family secrets threatening to surface, can Rosie confront her past before it consumes her future?

When George Mottershead moved to the village of Upton-by-Chester in 1930 to realise his dream of opening a zoo without bars, his four-year-old daughter June had no idea how extraordinary her life would become. Soon her best friend was a chimpanzee called Mary, lion cubs and parrots were vying for her attention in the kitchen, and finding a bear tucked up in bed was no more unusual than talking to a tapir about granny's lemon curd. Pelican, penguin, or polar bear - for June, they were simply family.

She trusted a stranger with her secrets. Now she's paying the price. Frazzled mum, Emily, loves her four-year-old twin daughters. Amidst trying her best to be the perfect mum all while keeping her sanity intact, she finds solace in the anonymous internet forum MumsOnline during her darkest days. But when a newfound friendship takes a dark turn, and her past is exposed, Emily's perfect life is threatened.

For thousands of years, humans have been the architects of the natural world. Our activities have permanently altered the environment – for good and for bad. Nature’s Ghosts examines how the planet would have looked before humans scrubbed away its diversity: from landscapes carved out by megafauna to the primeval forests that emerged following the last ice age, and from the eagle-haunted skies of the Dark Ages to the flower-decked farms of more recent centuries.

Alex, Karen and Misty were an inseparable trio at university. But when Alex died suddenly, the remaining two friends could no longer look each other in the eye, knowing they both had a part to play in her death. Thirty years later, Misty and Karen have long since moved on with their lives. But when Karen thinks she sees her former friend alive, she soon becomes obsessed with a past she thought she’d left behind. Before long, the perfect life she’s built for herself starts to unravel, and it seems as though history might just be repeating itself.

Susannah has had a tough year. After a knotty divorce, moving to a small town in the south of England with her two sons is exactly the fresh start she needs. Charlotte is delighted when Susannah arrives in town. Charlotte may appear to have the perfect husband, the perfect family, the perfect house, but she needs someone to confide in. The two women instantly become best friends. But underneath the surface, secrets, lies and betrayals are all hiding. And when the truth comes out, not everyone will live to tell the tale.

Smash all the Windows won the inaugural Selfies Book Award in 2019. It has taken conviction to right the wrongs. It will take courage to learn how to live again. London, 22 August 2003. A day that began like any other would end in tragedy. Fifty-eight people set off for work, only to never return. For more than thirteen years, the search for truth has eaten up everything: marriages, families, health, careers and finances. A flawed justice system failed the victims' kin, but hope arises when a rookie law student scrutinizes the disaster and uncovers potential answers.

Minnie and Bert are over the moon to have their three grown-up children home for the first time in a decade. But having Lizzie, Jess, Owen and the grandchildren under one roof isn’t without its dramas. Lizzie is off the alcohol (although emergency gin doesn’t count), Jess is juggling a toddler and a newborn, but it’s Owen who has the power to throw a grenade into everything.

Lara Feigel listens to birds outside her window—their circling, strident calls—and thinks of D. H. Lawrence. It is the spring of 2020 and, as the pandemic takes hold, she locks down in rural Oxfordshire with her partner, her two children, and that most explosive of writers. Proceeding month by month through the year, she sets out to start again with Lawrence: to find vital literary companionship; to use him as a guide to rural living and even, unexpectedly, to child-rearing; to find a way through his writing to excavate the modern world she feels he helped bring into being.

To the outside world, the Goodlights are perfect. Julia is a lawyer, Paul a stay-at-home dad who has dedicated his life to helping their daughter Chrissie achieve her dreams as a talented violinist. But on the night of a prestigious music competition, which has the power to change everything for Chrissie and her family, Chrissie goes missing. She puts on the performance of a lifetime, then completely disappears. Suddenly every single crack, every single secret that the family is hiding risks being exposed. Because the Goodlights aren’t perfect. Not even close.

When a missing teenage girl reappears unharmed but pregnant, the case falls to DI Edina Ogborne, the newest recruit of Canterbury Police. But Ed’s already got her hands full with a team who don’t want her, an ex who won’t quit and terrible guilt over a secret from her past. As Ed investigates the case, she discovers Canterbury has seen this crime not once, but several times before. And when Ed and her detectives encounter missing historic police files, falsified school records and Ed’s new lover as a prime suspect, it becomes clear that the system has been corrupted.

When a young woman is found dead in her own bedroom, the Canterbury police are baffled. There’s no sign of a break-in and no evidence. It’s as though the killer has vanished overnight. DI Edina Ogborne is determined to uncover the truth, and, when another young woman survives a similar attack, she’s convinced the two incidents are connected. But the new victim, Gina, has her own ideas about how to bring her attacker to justice. As Ed investigates, she soon realises not everything is quite what it seems.

Frankie Carlisle finds herself back at Feywood—her family's crumbling manor house—after yet another disastrous break-up. Her sisters Juliet and Martha try to comfort her, but Frankie can’t help but wonder why everything always seems to go wrong in her life…Then a charming stranger arrives on the grounds, and Frankie's world is turned upside down once more. Could this unexpected encounter be the key to mending her broken heart and restoring the faded glory of Feywood, or will old wounds sabotage this last chance at happiness?