Showing results by narrator "Julia Franklin" in All Categories

GP Lizzie Browne moves from London to a small coastal town looking forward to a quiet life, but when she finds a murdered patient on her first day it seems that perhaps Stibbington is not so quiet after all. DCI Adam Maguire and colleague Steve Grayson welcome this break from their normal routine, except that there seems to be no apparent motive for anyone to kill a harmless young dropout. But Lizzie’s peace is to be further shattered when a second body is found in her own garden.

Robyn Moss just wants a simple wedding. A quiet ceremony; a picnic on the beach; dancing barefoot on the sand until the sun goes down. But first, Robyn has one very important thing to do - before embracing her future, she needs to uncover her past. As she sets out to find her birth mother, a tangled thread of love, loss and betrayal that ties together three generations of women begins to emerge. As her wedding day approaches, Robyn discovers that where there is heartbreak, there is hope - and that in the end, love will always win.

Rose and Myrtle Sylvester look up to their older sister, Peggy. She is the sensible, reliable one in the household of women headed by their grandmother, Grace Booth, and their mother, Mary Sylvester. When war is declared in 1939 they must face the hardships together and huge changes in their lives are inevitable. For Rose, there is the chance to fulfil her dream of becoming a clippie on Sheffield's trams like Peggy. But for Myrtle, the studious, clever one in the family, war may shatter her ambitions.

Daniel Kind's relationship with Miranda is on the rocks. After the bright lights of London, Miranda feels isolated in the Lake District and Daniel fears that she will just up and leave. And Miranda wouldn't be the first: ten years ago Emma Bestwick left her cottage and never returned. Her disappearance went unaccounted for, much to the chagrin of DCI Hannah Scarlett, head of the local Cold Case Review Team. But in a small, rural community, someone is bound to know something. And that someone has recently started calling the local newspaper and dropping hints about Emma's death.

Actress Enora Andressen is facing the perfect storm. Her favourite French director, Remy Despret, has lost his touch and is keeping dangerous company. Her agent, Rosa, has been seduced by a kiss-and-tell novel of doubtful provenance. While H, sicker by the day at home at Flixcombe Manor, is battling both Long Covid and something far darker. Devoting herself to H, Enora needs good news, and it arrives in the shape of a fascinating Remy idea based on Flixcombe's role during the Second World War.

Manchester, 1920. Carrie Jenkins reels from the revelation that her beloved father was shot for desertion during the Great War, not tragically killed in heroic action, as she had previously been led to believe. Worse, Carrie's sweetheart jilts her on the eve of their wedding, despite her pregnancy. Facing some tough choices and needing to provide a home for her baby and invalid mother, Carrie is forced to accept the unsettling advances of Ralph Armstrong. It is a decision she will regret.

These are the facts I collect. My son, Gabriel, met a woman called Mariela in a bar. She went home with him, where they had sex. They next morning she was found in an allotment. Mariela is dead. Gabriel has been asked to report to Camden Police station in six hours for questioning.

Professor Olivia Sweetman has worked hard to achieve the life she loves, with a high-flying career as a TV presenter and historian, three children and a talented husband. But as she stands before a crowd at the launch of her new best seller, she can barely pretend to smile. Her life has spiralled into deceit, and if the truth comes out, she will lose everything. Only one person knows what Olivia has done.

Kesterly-on-Sea is full of secrets. Some are darker than others; many are shameful. One is even deadly. Andee is an ex-detective whose marriage is breaking up. So when a young female student disappears without a trace, she throws herself into the search. Meanwhile the town's beloved Rowzee Cayne has just discovered that she is terminally ill and doesn't want to burden her family and friends with the news. Andee and Rowzee don't know it yet, but their journeys are going to help them uncover a secret.

Fancy Jones, best-selling crime writer, discovers that someone is trying to kill her. When she is invited to lecture at a writers’ conference in the Derbyshire Dales, she leaps at the chance to leave London and hopefully escape the threat of her assassin. Events turn sour when a body is found floating in a lake at the conference venue, and bizarre things start happening to Fancy. Suspicion falls on the other delegates but has her stalker followed her?

A new Regency romance, where scandal and seduction are rife! Richard, Lord Ledbury, has had his fair share of adventure on warring battlefields, but even this seasoned soldier isn’t prepared for the outrageous escapades going on in London’s ballrooms! Lady Jayne Chilcott is under orders to find a husband, and Lord Ledbury has caught her eye. But nothing is simple when courting under the glittering spotlight of the ton…

Blanche Longhurst is a pilot with the Air Transport Auxiliary, delivering Spitfires from factories to air bases around the country during World War Two. She believes herself to be safe from the direct conflict but during one routine trip, bad weather causes her to lose her bearings and projects her into activities that go against her sense of morality. She finds herself in another war, in another country where the anti-Nazi offensive is filled with subterfuge and personal betrayal.

When she receives a wedding invitation from one of her former patients, forensic psychiatrist Dr Claire Roget is more than a little alarmed. Highly intelligent and manipulative, Jerome Barclay suffers from a severe personality disorder. Although she has never been able to prove it, Claire believes him to be highly dangerous, responsible for at least three suspicious deaths - and she fears for the safety of his new bride.

Chrissie knew that Richie had loved her for all the twenty-three years they’d been together, loved their three daughters and their house in Highgate and their happy, chaotic existence. Richie gave her everything, except the one thing that would have made her life perfect. She even had a sparkling ring - but it was not a wedding ring, and did not bring with it the security of marriage. That belonged to Margaret, back in Newcastle where Richie had started off as a musician, before he became famous.

Living in Victorian Oxfordshire, Poppy Woods has suffered neglect and cruelty from her very first breath. Illegally adopted by the tight fisted and merciless Sidney Woods and his wicked wife, life in the quiet hamlet of Hurst is a daily challenge for Poppy, softened only by her caring neighbours, the Greenfield family, who keep a watchful eye over her. Ella Greenfield is like a true sister, and a childhood love for Arthur Greenfield blossoms.

Viola hasn't had much luck with men. Her first husband, Marco, companion of her youth and father of her only child, left her when he realised he was gay. Her second, Rhys, ended his high-octane, fame-filled life by driving his Porsche into a wall. No wonder her family always believes she needs looking after, and her friends think she really shouldn't be allowed out on her own...Which is why, at the age of thirty-five, she finds herself shamefully back at home, living with Mum.

1942: Saba Tarcan is a talented young singer with big dreams. So when an opportunity arises to entertain the troops in the Middle East, she jumps at the chance, cutting short a burgeoning love affair with a young RAF pilot, Dom. It soon becomes clear that entertaining won’t be Saba’s only mission. It's a move that will jeopardize not only her own safety, but also the love of her life.

Growing up in a small Wiltshire village, Abbie Morris knows what lies ahead of her - a life of drudgery as a menial servant, like that of her sisters. But everything changes when Abbie is twelve and their emotional, spirited mother casts them into a crisis for which no one is prepared. Six years later the Morris family have rebuilt their lives, and when Abbie and Beatie, Abbie's adored elder sister, set off for the county fair, the world seems a good place. But their new-found happiness is not to last.

To their friends, Lily and Freddy have a great marriage. He taught her to love again after the death of her first husband. But when Freddy becomes tense and distracted, a life-changing truth is revealed. Freddy has built up massive gambling debts that threaten to destroy not only his life, but Lily's as well. Her friends and family urge her to forget him and move on - easier said than done. Is her willingness to give him a second chance just down to loyalty? Or is the truth something altogether darker?

Prunella Pearce, Bree, and the other ladies of the Winterbottom Women’s Institute are planning to spend Halloween at the Montgomery Hall Hotel murder-mystery weekend, just as the Hall’s past comes back to haunt it. The hotel is now in the incapable hands of Tarragon Montgomery, with its faltering finances overseen by elderly matriarch Cecily. Meanwhile, the local actress hired to play Psychic Selma for the weekend has been replaced by an impostor. But who is she and what is her agenda?