A Friend of the Family

Shy and gawky, Ana has always daydreamed about living the life of her exotic half-sister Bee, a pop singer who had a number one hit single before she inexplicably vanished from the celebrity scene. When Bee turns up dead, Ana is dispatched to the big city to clear out her apartment. Instantly seduced by the second-hand glamour of Bee's baubles, bangles, and bottles of Pierre-Jouet, Ana takes up with Bee's wild club-hopping cronies. 

When Claire sees Hannah Wilson at an exclusive Manhattan hair salon, it's like a knife slicing through barely healed scars. It may have been 10 years since Claire last saw Hannah, but she has thought of her every day, and not in a good way. So Claire does what anyone would do in her position - she stalks her. Hannah is now Mrs. Carter, living the charmed life that should have been Claire's. It's the life Claire used to have before Hannah came along and took it all away from her.

From adolescent snogging to apartment shares, relationships, career crises, and children, Vince and Joy is the unforgettable story of two lives lived separately but forever entwined. Back in the '80s, teenagers Vince and Joy met, fell desperately in love, parted, and never quite said goodbye. Now, nearly 20 years later, they’ve both begun to ask themselves if that long-ago romance was the enduring love they’ve been searching for.... 

1990. Toby Dobbs received a big Victorian house with too many bedrooms to count as a wedding present from his father, but his marriage is over within a month. Very alone, and very lonely, Toby posts an advertisement seeking the Unexpectedly Alone to become his roommates. Fifteen years later, the wayward souls he takes in are still living with him, with no intention of leaving. 2004. Toby Dobbs has met Leah Pilgrim from across the road, and they're falling in love.

Thirty years ago, Nicola Watson lived with her parents and older brother in a respectable suburb. Now a successful lawyer in the city, with a life poles apart from her dark beginnings, Nicola has returned home for her mother’s funeral. All Carol wanted was to protect her children, but escaping her husband was only the beginning of the story. And when Nicola learns the truth of what her mother did, it will change everything she thought she knew about herself and her family. A gripping, emotional story of family secrets, and the strength of a mother’s love in the darkest times.

Julian Jessop, an eccentric, lonely artist and septuagenarian believes that most people aren’t really honest with each other. But what if they were? And so he writes - in a plain, green journal - the truth about his own life and leaves it in his local café. It’s run by the incredibly tidy and efficient Monica, who furtively adds her own entry and leaves the book in the wine bar across the street. Before long, the others who find the green notebook add the truths about their own deepest selves - and soon find each other In Real Life at Monica’s Café.

Gifted musician Clemency Thompson is playing for tourists on the streets of Southern France when she receives an urgent text message. Her childhood friend, Lucy, is demanding her immediate return to London. It’s happening, says the message. The baby is back. Libby Jones was only six months old when she became an orphan. Now 25, she’s astounded to learn of an inheritance that will change her life. A gorgeous, dilapidated townhouse in one of London’s poshest neighborhoods has been held in a trust for her all these years. Now, it’s hers. 

When a man is found on a British beach, drifting in and out of consciousness, with no identification and unable to speak, interest in him is sparked immediately. From the hospital staff who find themselves inexplicably drawn to him, to international medical experts who are baffled by him, to the national press who call him Mr. Nobody, everyone wants answers. Who is this man? And what happened to him?

You’ve never met the other wives. None of you know each other, and because of this unconventional arrangement, you can see your husband only one day a week. But you love him so much, you don’t care. Or at least that’s what you’ve told yourself. But one day, while you’re doing laundry, you find a scrap of paper in his pocket - an appointment reminder for a woman named Hannah, and you just know it’s another of the wives.

She moved far away to try and forget her past. A past that seeped back in when she least expected it and crushed her soul, over and over. She tried to keep the evidence packed away in boxes high up on a closet shelf like carefully packing away a tragic part of her life. As if sealing the boxes was sealing away a time in her life she desperately wanted to go back and change. Until one day, a mysterious letter arrives from an unknown sender that unravels everything.

After her grandmother Arlette's death, Betty is finally ready to begin her life. She had forfeited university, parties, boyfriends, summer jobs in order to care for Arlette. Now she's ready for whatever life throws at her, and, since the will included a beneficiary unknown to her who lives in the city, she heads there to find the mysterious woman. In 1920s London, Arlette is starting her new life in a time of postwar change. Beautiful and charismatic, she's drawn into a hedonistic world, but then tragedy strikes, and she flees back to her childhood home....

Kat remembers the days when her only daughter Amy wouldn't leave her side. But now Amy is grown up and gone - to university in a town several hours away. Kat's house - which once felt too full, too noisy, too busy - is deathly quiet, and Kat awaits the daily phone call to tell her that her beloved daughter is thriving and happy. But one day Amy doesn’t call. Kat’s husband and friends think she is being paranoid. But Kat knows right away that something is very wrong.

In a split second, Morgan Kincaid’s life changes forever. She’s on her way home from work when a mother begs her to take her baby, then places the infant in her arms. Before Morgan can stop her, the distraught mother jumps in front of an oncoming train. Morgan has never seen this woman before, and she can’t understand what would cause a person to give away her child and take her own life. She also can’t understand how this woman knew her name.

Naomi and I are best friends. School runs, dog walks, a shoulder to cry on over a glass of wine - we’re inseparable. But now my husband has walked out, I need her more than ever. I know she will help me pick up the pieces. Because she knows about the lie I told to protect her. She knows how much I’ve sacrificed for this friendship. And she’d never let anyone hurt me. Would she?

Ralph and Smith are flatmates and best mates. Nothing can come between them - until the gorgeous Jemima moves in. They're both falling for her, but which one of them does Jem want? Upstairs, Karl and Siobhan are happily unmarried and have been for 15 years - until Cheri moves into the flat above and fixes her sights on Karl. Why should a little problem like his girlfriend get in her way?