Showing results by author "Andrew & Lyn" in All Categories

Incredible Science Fiction collates a collection of some of the very best science fiction stories published in the ‘50s in one volume. All these stories (with the exception of "The Goldfish") are now in the public domain and were original published in Worlds of IF Science Fiction magazine. This is a lovingly curated collection of some of the very best stories published in the ’50s. This collection includes the Hugo Award-nominated “Rat in the Skull” by Rog Phillips. It also includes an original story by the curator and editor of this collection: Andrew Gibson.

Liverpool, 1935. Monica Savage is delighted when new neighbours move in next door and she and Joan Copperfield quickly become firm friends. While Monica's father has a good job as a guard on the railway, Joan's family are harder up, with her sailor dad Billy mostly off at sea and restless when he's home - Mersey View is no substitute for the exotic places he sails to.

1920s Liverpool is the beautifully portrayed setting for The Sisters O'Donnell - a delightful saga about three young Irish women building new lives for themselves, from best-selling author Lyn Andrews. Perfect for fans of Anne Baker, Dilly Court and Nadine Dorries. Throughout County Tipperary the three sisters were known as the Sisters O'Donnell. They all have red hair but little else in common. Together they move to Liverpool in the 1920s to make a new life for themselves - although each sister intends to go about it in her own sweet way.

Liverpool, 1901. The Tempest family is all but destitute, barely able to put food on the table. When Florrie falls ill with pneumonia and Arthur is imprisoned after a drunken fight, their 13-year-old daughter, Lizzie, finds herself parentless, desperate and alone. Despite her young age, Lizzie has spirit and determination, and she knows that she must find work to keep herself off the streets. In a stroke of luck, she gets a job in the match factory, and foreman George Rutherford takes her under his wing.

Cat Cleary is a 16-year-old Irish 'slummy' arriving in Liverpool to seek her fortune. Joe Calligan, a young steam-packet deckhand, thinks she's the loveliest girl he's ever seen and hasn't the heart to tell her that Liverpool is full of people tramping the streets looking for work. And then Cat sees the White Empress, a huge luxury liner. In that moment her ambition is born - to be chief stewardess. In spite of her poverty, her lack of education, her family background, Cat Cleary sets about realising her incredible dream.

It is 1919. Liverpool has been devastated by World War I. But at last the war is over. Emily Parkinson goes back into service and enjoys the return to normality. But her sister, Phoebe-Anne, has ideas beyond her station. Working as a lady's maid, Phoebe-Ann hopes that one day she will be more than just a friend to her mistress's shell-shocked brother James Mercer. When Emily is brutally attacked, the sisters' lives come close to ruin.

Liverpool, World War II. Monica Eustace and Joan McDonald met as next-door-neighbours living in Mersey View in Liverpool. Their friendship is a close as ever, though they're married now, and sharing Monica's grand house on the other side of the city. But war clouds are gathering, casting a shadow over the happy future they dream of with their young husbands. Meanwhile, in London, Joan's half-sister Bella is overwhelmed with the glitz and glamour of the city while she's training as a singer - but will she forget her friends back home?

Cathie Kinrade is all too used to hardship. Growing up in a fishing community on the Isle of Man in the 1930s, she sees her dad and brothers set sail daily on dangerous seas while her mam struggles to put food on the table. Cathie has little hope of better for her own future until a chance encounter gives her the opportunity to change her fortune for ever. Fiercely determined, Cathie leaves behind home and family for Liverpool, a bustling, modern city full of possibility.

As daughter of the blacksmith in her tiny Irish village, 15-year-old Kitty Doyle knows little of the ways of the world. But she has to grow up fast when her widowed father remarries and she has no choice but to leave the family home. Luckily, there's work to be found over the water in 1920s Liverpool and soon Kitty has a job in a grocer's, where she also catches the eye of the owner. With Kitty's input the business is soon thriving - but tragedy lies ahead, and she must endure many trials and tribulations before she can find true happiness....

It's 1945 and the war is finally over. For the Devlin family in Liverpool, the wartime years have been almost too much to bear. But at long last sisters Grace and Chrissie can return to their normal lives. Level-headed and hard-working, Grace wants nothing more than to meet a nice man and settle down. Vivacious Chrissie, though, craves fun and excitement - and there's not much of that to be had in the austere post-war years. So when Chrissie meets Pat Kilroy, a handsome Irishman, she's swept off her feet and eagerly follows Pat to Ireland. Chrissie soon realises she has made a terrible mistake, and Grace rushes to her side to help.

When her sister disappears, can Ellen Ryan keep her beloved niece safe? For the inhabitants of Liverpool's Milton Street a steady income and a roof over their heads are luxuries. The Ryan family have barely grown accustomed to such things when a fire destroys their father Jack's modest coal haulage business, leaving Jack broken and his family facing ruin. They're forced to turn to Conor, Jack's brother from Ireland, a man whose noisy joviality 17-year-old Ellen Ryan suspects hides a mean viciousness.

The Great War is over, and sisters Iris and Rose are adjusting to life in their modest Liverpool home after their brother Charlie has returned from the front. But when their mother sends Rose to the beautiful Welsh village of Tregarron to recover from an illness she discovers a new world of possibility at her feet. There, she obtains a job as housemaid to the wealthy but tragic Rhys-Pritchard family and falls in love with the young but troubled head of house. Meanwhile at home, Charlie, keen to improve his social standing, becomes engaged to the daughter of a successful coal merchant, while Iris falls for a porter from the local fruit market. Then tragedy strikes, and the whole family must pull together if they are to survive the turmoil ahead. Their support of one another can only bring them closer together, but will they be forced to put their dreams on hold in the process?

For Mary Callaghan, marriage has brought heartaches and disappointment. But with it have come joys, the greatest of which are her daughters. And what Mary wants most in the world for her girls is what she never had - a husband who will offer the security her own hard-drinking, free-spending, brash-talking Jack denied her. But when Daisy confesses she's pregnant, Mary knows the future looks grim, for the father's rough, pleasure-loving Sam O'Grady. As Nell watches her sister sink into bitter poverty, she begins to wonder if she could ever allow herself to fall in love, when her own mother and sister are suffering so much.

Transport yourself to 1920s Liverpool, to be moved and delighted by this wonderful novel from one of the UK's best-loved saga authors. In 1920s Liverpool, Jane, her little brother Alfie and their mother Ellen have faced the horrors of the workhouse together. But when Ellen dies, two very different paths open up for the siblings. Jane is sent to work in the Empire Laundry and builds a new life for herself with the neighbours who take her in.

Best friends Bernie and Molly are just seventeen when they set off from Ireland in 1928, heading for Liverpool. They quickly find jobs and rooms; soon both women are in love with local men. Tragically, though, Bernie is widowed when she's still barely an adult, while Molly has chosen a bad 'un and faces the deepest shame when he deserts her. But this difficult start only reinforces the bond between the women, and gives them the strength to build a brighter future...

Life in 1920s Liverpool for sisters Gloria and Betty Jenkins is secure and comfortable. Elder sister Gloria finds romance with the boy next door, until her wealthy, but snobbish and interfering, Aunt Sybil steps in, offering her the opportunity of a lifetime. A trip to New York gives Gloria everything she desires - including a wealthy husband. Meanwhile, Betty chooses a career at sea, which offers challenges, personal danger, and romance. But with the Wall Street Crash of 1929, tragedy strikes for one of the sisters and through these trials they come to value the bonds of family more than ever.

The George pub in the backstreets of Liverpool lost its landlord when he ran off with the barmaid. Now his wife Eve runs the pub with the help of her three daughters and together they face up to all that life can throw at them. Warm-hearted, full of nostalgic descriptions of life in an earlier era, Lyn Andrews' latest has all the ingredients that her many thousands of fans look for and find in each new novel.

Angela O'Rourke is six when her parents hand her over to an aunt and uncle in a distant village. It's a common practice for large, hard-up families in 1950s Ireland, but for Angela it means that her mother and father don't love her any more. Still, she's well cared for till she's 16, when her uncle starts to take too much of an interest in her. Moving to Liverpool in the early 1960s, she becomes a success in the world of fashion design. The pain of a disastrous love affair sends her home to Ireland just after the death of her aunt. There, among old papers, Angela makes an astonishing discovery....

Mary McGann's marriage has always been difficult, thanks to her husband Frank's drunken, jealous nature. Only because the little money he earns in the docks keeps food in the mouths of their children is Mary prepared to put up with him. But when Frank throws them all out on the street, Mary flees to her family in Dublin. There she meets Richard O'Neill, a handsome though solitary man. Despite the attraction between them, Mary's not looking for love....

When best friends Dee Campbell and Jean Williams leave school, in 1959, it feels like every opportunity awaits them. Their families haven't long moved from a rundown part of the city to leafy Kirkby when Jean's father wins the Irish sweepstake and soon Jean's set up her own hairdressing salon, while both girls have fallen for good-looking lads with prospects. It's hard to imagine being any happier. But Dee's father is about to discover a disturbing truth about her fiancé. With one revelation, the Campbells are torn apart. As Dee flees to Ireland, Jean marries Tony, blissfully unaware that she's not the only pretty girl to catch his eye....