Showing results by narrator "Rawlins Penelope" in All Categories

When an eager and curious Jane Eyre arrives at Thornfield Hall her sexual desires are instantly awakened. Who is the enigmatic Rochester whom she instantly feels attracted to? What are the strange and yet captivating noises coming from the attic? Only one thing is certain: Jane Eyre may have arrived at Thornfield an unfulfilled and tentative woman, but she will leave a very different person.…

Imagine being married for 28 years with three children, a lovely house and a husband who travels a lot - but you still love each other. Or: imagine being happily married for 17 years. You have one daughter and your husband travels a lot. One day you get a call that turns your world upside down: your husband is dead. You go to the funeral…and meet his other widow…

Emma did not go to war looking for love, but Adam is unlike any other. Under the secret shadow of trauma, Emma decides to leave Iraq and joins Adam to settle in Colorado. But isolation and fear find her, once again, when Adam is redeployed. Torn between a deep fear for Adam’s safety and a desire to be back there herself, Emma copes by throwing herself into a new role mentoring an Iraqi refugee family. But when Adam comes home, he brings the conflict back with him. Emma had considered the possibility that her husband might not come home from war. She had not considered that he might return a stranger.

Our memories define us don't they? And Skye Threppel lost most of hers in a car crash that stole the lives of her best friend and fiancé. It's left scars, inside and out, which have destroyed her career and her confidence. Skye hopes a trip to meet the actor she idolises will help her heal. But she bumps into mysterious Sci-fi writer Jack Whitaker first.

The Axiom Diamond is a mythical relic, with the power to show its bearer any truth they desire. Men have sought for it across many continents for centuries but in vain. When trainee sorceress Aimee de Laurent's first ever portal-casting goes awry, she and her mentor are thrown into the race to find the gem, on the skyship Elysium. Opposing them are the infamous magic-wielding knights of the Eternal Order and their ruthless commander, Lord Azrael, who will destroy everything in their path....

In 1922, Christian, a young artist, travels to Weimar to begin his studies at the Bauhaus, where the avant-garde confronts conservative elements around it. With postwar Germany in turmoil, while the Bauhaus attempts to explore radical ways of thinking and living, Christian finds that love will change him forever. And in 1970s London Duncan uses his inheritance to establish the country's first gay bookshop in the face of opposition from the neighbours and victimisation by the police.

Mind-boggling, heart-rending and darkly comic, this is the full story for the first time, from the writer of the Guardian column "Mid-Life Ex-Wife". When her husband fell in love with someone else, Stella Grey thought she'd be unhappy for the rest of her life. But then she realised that she needed to take her future in her own hands. She needed to meet someone wonderful and find a heartfix for heartbreak. So she joined online dating sites and embarked on a mission.

England, 1944. As I look around the childhood room I used to share with my twin brother, Ed, I realize just how much the war has taken from us already. Ed was never the same after he helped our father in the Dunkirk rescue. Clutching his call-up letter in my hands, I know that Ed has fled, leaving behind his family and all he has ever known. But I know that if Ed fails to accept his call-up then he will be found and imprisoned. I’m his sister, and I’ll do whatever it takes to protect him

Sophie knows she should count herself lucky when she finds herself catapulted into the A-list after the surprise hit of a budget movie, but she just wishes she could be a proper actress, in proper, serious films. As Sophie’s career begins to decline her fate seems to be entwined with that of her favourite actress, Eve Noel: the epitome of 50s Hollywood glamour…

How do you hold on to a love that is slipping away from you? How do you cope when every kiss is a countdown to goodbye? The first time Molly kissed Ryan, she knew they'd be together forever. But now, six years later, when Ryan kisses her, Molly realises how many of them she wasted - because the future holds something which they never could have predicted....

Anna wasn’t looking for love when Adam swept her off her feet, but there was no denying their connection, and she believed they would be together forever. Years later, cracks have appeared in their relationship. Anna is questioning whether their love can really be eternal when a cruel twist of fate delivers a crushing blow and Anna and Adam are completely lost to one another. Now, Anna needs Adam more than ever, but the way back to him has life-changing consequences.

Paul and Elaine have two boys and a beautiful home, yet they find themselves thoroughly, inexplicably stuck. Obsessed with 'making things good again', they spin the quiet terrors of family life into a fantastical frenzy that careens well and truly out of control. From a hilarious encounter in the pantry with a Stepford Wife neighbour, to a hostage situation at the school, Homes lays bare the foundations of marriage and family life.

Elena MacKinnon has spent the last seven years training to become a proper English lady. When her childhood friend, Captain Theo Donovan, returns from serving in the Navy, he brings along with him Elena’s humiliation for the ill-advised and ardent love letter she wrote him before his departure, which he ignored entirely. Elena hopes to simultaneously stifle his memory of the letter and make him regret overlooking her, showing him just how fine an English lady she can be. The only problem? She is not English but a proud Scot—and her heart may be more enamored with Theo than ever.

One year ago, Casey Cassidy was happy. She had great friends, a wonderful teaching job and a busy life - until with one missed flight, everything changes. One year later, Casey knows what it means to find that once-in-a-lifetime love people dream of. But when Ben leaves, her heart is shattered. Left facing a year of firsts without him, piecing her life back together seems impossible. But then a friend offers her a home in rural France. In the solitude and emptiness, Casey needs to comes to terms with what’s happened and find a way to move forward.

Legendary Hollywood bad boy Mac Brody refuses to be judged by Juno Delamare for declining his brother's wedding invitation - but he can't get feisty Juno out of his head! So he goes to the wedding - to strip away her defences and her sexy bridesmaid dress. When their steamy night hits the headlines, Mac sweeps Juno away for a two-week affair... Soon Juno realises she has more than memories to hold dear!

Leni loves birds. So when two feather-brained professors visit her island home on a mission to bring back the dodo, she jumps at the chance to help them. But the famous bird has been extinct for more than 300 years - and Sugar King Benny Shuster will stop at nothing to keep it that way. Can Leni and the squabbling professors achieve the impossible?

This Christmas, a little dog is in for a big adventure.... Meet Claude. He's a loveable, big-eared, permanently hungry French bulldog who loves his humans - the McCawley family of number 11 Maple Drive, to be precise. When Daisy and Oliver McCawley start using new words like, ferry, chateau and France, Claude realises they won't be spending this Christmas at home. Only, when he finds himself on the street as the family car pulls away, Claude realises he is alone.

At 23 Alice Hare leaves England for New York. She becomes fixated on Mizuko Himura, a Japanese writer living in New York, whose life story has strange parallels to her own and whom she believes is her "Internet twin". What seems to Mizuko like a chance encounter with Alice is anything but - after all, in the age of connectivity, nothing is coincidence. Their subsequent relationship is doomed from the outset, exposing a tangle of lies and sexual encounters as three families across the globe collide.

Bernadette is expert at hiding the truth. She has built her career as a journalist on her talent for lulling powerful men into a false sense of security, then exposing them in her ruthless profile pieces. But in Radley Blake, she may have met her match. Immune to her charms, he seems to see through every layer of her carefully constructed act, right to the truth of who she is inside. We think we're looking for love - but what if it's ourselves we need to find?

Sir Tode has finally died at the age of 93. Lady Tode wants to leave the country to spend her remaining years in Capri. Unfortunately, her three tiresome children are either unwilling, or unable (too mad, too lefty or too happy in Australia), to take on management of their large and important home, so the mantle passes to a distant relative and his glamorous wife. Not long after the new owners take over, Lady Tode is found dead in the mausoleum. Accident? Or is there more going on behind the scenes of Tode Hall than an outsider would ever guess?