Showing titles in 20th Century

On a sunny afternoon in late June, Cambridge professor Joseph Reavley is summoned from a student cricket match to learn that his parents have died in an automobile crash. Joseph’s brother, Matthew, as officer in the Intelligence Service, reveals that their father had been en route to London to turn over to him a mysterious secret document—allegedly with the power to disgrace England forever and destroy the civilized world. A paper so damning that Joseph and Matthew dared mention it only to their restless younger sister. Now it has vanished.

In London, twenty-six-year-old Venetia Stanley—aristocratic, clever, bored, reckless—is part of a fast group of upper-crust bohemians and socialites known as “The Coterie.” She’s also engaged in a clandestine love affair with the Prime Minister, H. H. Asquith, a man more than twice her age. He writes to her obsessively, sharing the most sensitive matters of state.

Two officers from the American troops stationed in Caserta, Italy, not far from Naples, have been found murdered. Lieutenant Norman Landry was found behind a supply tent with his neck snapped. Captain Max Galante, MD, was strangled on the same night, and his body left in a garden outside HQ. The MOs are completely different, and it seems like the officers had no connection to each other, but one frightening fact links the murders: each body was discovered with a single playing card: the Lieutenant, the ten of hearts; the Captain, the jack of hearts.

Ein bewegender Roman über eine junge Frau in den Wirren der Nachkriegszeit, um Geheimnisse, Verlust und ein neues Leben. Von Bestsellerautorin Marion Johanning. Deutschland im Mai 1945: endlich Frieden. Mit ihrem Akkordeon auf dem Rücken macht die junge Emma van Kall sich auf den Weg in ihre zerbombte Heimatstadt Köln. Ihr Mann wird an der Ostfront vermisst, ihr Elternhaus wurde beschädigt und geplündert und die Familie ist gezeichnet von den schrecklichen Kriegsjahren. Aber das Leben geht weiter. Mit Tatkraft und Fantasie kämpft Emma um Essen, Heizmaterial und Medikamente für die kranke Mutter.

Born and raised in a small village on the Yorkshire moors, Leah Thompson grows more beautiful with each passing day. When she catches the attention of the influential, troubled Delancey family, she knows her life will never be the same again. Years later, Leah takes the modelling world by storm, travelling from Milan to London and New York and living life in the lap of luxury. But her past follows her like a dark shadow, mysteriously intertwined with the tragic tale of two young siblings in Poland during the Second World War.

In Nottingham, England, widow Emma Taylor finds herself in desperate need of a job to provide for herself and her beloved daughter, Olivia. But with the legal restrictions prohibiting widows with children from most employment opportunities, she’s left with only one option: persuading the manageress at Boots’ Booklover’s Library to take a chance on her.

Holland, 1944: Undercover British agent Nancy Callaghan has been given her toughest case yet. A key member of the Dutch resistance has been captured, and Nancy must play the role of a wealthy Nazi to win over a notorious SS officer, Detlef Keller, and gain crucial information. But as Nancy infiltrates the Dutch SS, she finds herself catching the eye of an even more senior member of the Party. Is Nancy in too deep, or can Tom reach her before she gets caught?

Frühling 1945: Es kann nicht mehr lange dauern, bis der Frieden endlich da ist und Johann heim kann zu seiner Braut Emmy und dem Neugeborenen. Nur wenige Wochen – die aber über Leben und Tod entscheiden. Als Johann und seine Kameraden nahe der Heimat stationiert sind, ergreifen sie die Chance und desertieren. Johann versteckt sich in der Scheune seiner Tante, die ihn versorgt, beide stets in der Angst, entdeckt zu werden. Nach einigen Tagen taucht plötzlich Frieda auf, das sechzehnjährige Nachbarsmädchen.

For the courageous Bletchley Park girls, the fourth Christmas of the war is approaching fast. It should be a happy time, yet life throws them challenges they could never have imagined. Lily's heart is torn in two when her boyfriend, Grant, is badly injured in an air raid. As he spirals into despair, she must find a way to give him hope again. Bronwyn has a new romance on the horizon. But will the widower's young daughter accept her, or will she jeopardise Bronwyn's hopes for love?

Lucinda McFarlane is engaged to be married to dashing Sir David Melcome, but their society wedding has to be scaled right down when war is declared. Will David even live to see their baby born? Mabel Oakley, once a maid for the McFarlanes, has inherited Thomas Clarke’s printing works, but an unexpected turn of events leaves her at the mercy of her father’s old enemy, solicitor John Sheridan, just as she is beginning to fall for his son. What can she do?

It’s 1945, there’s a brand-new Labour government, and Valentine Vere-Thissett, aged 23, is returning home from an undistinguished war, spent in the ranks. But following the death of his heroic older brother, and to his horror, Valentine is now Sir Valentine, seventh Baronet and extremely reluctant heir to Dimperley Manor, a gigantic liability, devoid of income, sodden with debt and half-filled with stuffed animals and dependent relatives – the latter intent on clinging to an impossibly outdated way of life.

Paris 1946: A young woman, Eve Archer, has come to Paris to find the father she never knew. She is soon caught up in a desperate race to prove her father's innocence against the accusation that he sold a French national treasure to Hitler during the war, and murdered the original owner to obtain it. Her efforts uncover the complicated friendship between two art dealers and the woman they both loved, a Russian artist named Kristina Belova.

Winter 1944: Months after the Liberation of France, ex-Boston cop Billy Boyle finds himself in a Paris reeling from the carnage it has endured but hopeful that an end to war is in sight. When Billy finds a rare piece of artwork after a tense shoot-out in the Père Lachaise Cemetery, he thinks it could be connected to the Syndicat du Renard, a shadowy network of Nazi sympathizers known to be smuggling stolen artwork out of France. Trailing the Syndicat, Billy discovers that someone with a high level of communications clearance may be using his position to aid the thieves.

In the quiet town of Houghton, Michigan, sixteen-year-old Nancy Harkness discovers a passion that ignites her heart in ways she never expected. The arrival of barnstormer pilots brings more than just the thrill of their daring stunts; it brings the promise of adventure. Nancy vows she will be a pilot someday. Years later, as the dark clouds of World War II gather on the horizon, Nancy’s dreams take a new and daring turn. With unwavering determination, she envisions a squadron of female pilots. Yet, her path is far from clear.

Meg Turner has a hard life. She lives on a lonely farm in the Lake District and her only company is her bully of a father and her brother, who resents her. They want to keep her at home, but Meg is desperate for more. She finds comfort in her best friend, Kath, and Lanky Lawson, who is more of a father figure to her than her own. Her true source of hope though, is Lanky’s son, Jack, who she loves and hopes to marry one day. However, as war looms on the horizon and the world is thrown into chaos, Meg realises that the only thing she can really count on is the land she loves.

Blackshirts march through the East End in 1930s London and the Jewish community is under threat of violence. In the midst of this, Jessie Warner discovers a family secret and turns to her mother for answers – but she is met with silence. Over in Bethnal Green, Hannah Blake reluctantly joins the Blackshirts, forced by her cold-hearted mother to do so. Next-door neighbour Emmie Smith looks on, wishing she could tell Hannah the truth about her family and provide her with hope for a brighter future.

In Nottingham, England, widow Emma Taylor finds herself in desperate need of a job. She and her beloved daughter, Olivia, have always managed just fine on their own, but with the legal restrictions prohibiting widows with children from most employment opportunities, she's left with only one option: persuading the manageress at Boots' Booklover's Library to take a chance on her with a job.

London, October 1940. As German bombers increase their nightly raids on the capital, the Blitz Girls must be braver than ever to protect innocent lives and keep the fight against Hitler alive. As each night becomes more dangerous for the Blitz Girls, will they have the strength to help each other through and keep the light alive in the darkness?

The aroma of chocolate was as familiar to Molly Freeman as the nose on her face. Living and schooling on Haxby Road alongside the Rowntrees Chocolate Factory, Molly watched the daily trudge of women employed there in their white uniforms as she sat at her school desk. When Molly secures a job on the production line at the factory, she's excited to become one of these women. As she labours hard at the factory, she meets Connie. Quickly the two form a close friendship, and Molly begins to see the world differently.

In 1945, twenty-five children, between the ages of four and fifteen, were welcomed to Sir Benjamin Drage's large country villa, Lingfield House. There they would receive the care of psychoanalyst, Anna Freud, daughter of the great Sigmund, and Alice Goldberger, her trusted colleague. Having endured childhood in the confines of the concentration camps, orphanages and the hideouts where their parents left them during the war, each of the children has a different, terrible and special story, each carries their own personal hell. Alice and her team fight to give them back a childhood.