Deborah Moggach

Seventeenth-century Amsterdam is a city in the grip of tulip mania, basking in the wealth it has generated....

At school they called her Porky on account of the pigs her family kept outside their bungalow near Heathrow. But she felt no different – not until she realised she was losing her innocence in a way that none of her friends could possibly imagine.

Enticed by advertisements for a luxury retirement home in India, a group of strangers leave England to begin a new life. On arrival, however, they discover the palace is a shell of its former self, the staff are more than a little eccentric and the days of the Raj appear to be long gone.

"Nobody in the world knows our secret...that I’ve ruined Bev's life, and she's ruined mine." Petra’s romantic life has always been a car crash....

James is getting on a bit and needs full-time help. So Phoebe and Robert, his middle-aged offspring, employ Mandy, who seems willing to take him off their hands. Soon Phoebe and Robert sense something is amiss....

Natalie is a girl who should be going somewhere. Beautiful, bright and ambitious, she's stuck in a dead-end job in the accounts department of Nu-Line Telecommunications, living her life through wild weekends and yearning for something more. When she sees a chance to change her life, she takes it.

Gordon Hammond, 65, a builder who has built up his own, modestly successful business, has a heart attack. Whilst recovering in hospital he falls in love with April, a young black nurse, and leaves Dorothy, his wife of 45 years, to set up home with her.

Jules is an unknown English actress with a precarious career and a wayward but irresistible boyfriend, Trevor. But then she gets the break of a lifetime – a part as stand-in for Lila Dune, American film star and sex-symbol – and her world is transformed.

The irrepressible Russell "Buffy" Buffery has upped sticks from London and moved to Knockton, Powys, to a B&B inherited from an old flame....

Pru's husband has walked out, leaving her alone to contemplate her future. She's missing not so much him, but the life they once had - picnicking on the beach with small children, laughing together, nestling up like spoons in the cutlery drawer as they sleep....

Always a rebel, Marianne was the first girl in her class to bleach her hair and learn how to smoke. A few boyfriends and one abortion later she falls in love with Salim, the proud and elegant Pakistani with eyes like treacle.

Though sisters, Ann and Viv couldn't be more different. Ann is reserved, sensible and – some would say – boring. Viv, always their father's favourite, is messy and impulsive, and a mother to two gorgeous daughters.

Take an ordinary, well-off family like the Prices. Watch what happens when one Sunday, 17-year-old Hannah disappears without a trace. See how the family rallies when a ransom note demands half a million pounds for Hannah's safe return. But it's when Hannah comes home that the story really begins.

Meet Buffy. With three ex-wives, a failing career and only his dog George for company, Buffy's bachelorhood is looking worryingly confirmed.

Desmond never did have much luck with women – except in getting them through their driving tests. Now a coach driver, he is at the most crucial crossroads of his life. His wife has thrown him out. The crisis serves only to deepen his despair over another failed liaison...