Fiction Women World War

Cliff's End Cottage is a local landmark. Perched on the South Devon coast, its garden has begun slowly toppling into the sea, yet the elderly and infamously stubborn owner, Stella, refuses to leave her home. When Holly, a young journalist and single mum struggling to make ends meet, decides to interview Stella about her life, at first she's given short shrift. However, helped by a slice or two of cake and a couple of friendly cats, a tentative friendship begins to develop between the two lonely women.

For fans of All the Light We Cannot See and The Tattooist of Auschwitz! From the sandy shores of America to the battered streets of London, one woman's search for love and redemption will defy all odds Young Adelia Monteforte begins the summer of 1941 aboard a crowded ship bound for America...

Staff wanted. Prospects excellent. Death - or worse - a certainty. When fourteen year old Rosie is knocked down one foggy evening, Dr Margaret Demeray suspects she had been escaping procurers masquerading as an employment agency. But the police are more interested in the cold blooded murder of a respectable man than the procurement of naive, impoverished girls, and Rosie won’t talk, other than to beg Margaret to stop her friend Violet being caught by the same people. Then the discovery of a dead boy during one of Fox’s missions raises more questions than it answers.

London, 1941: When Frankie receives the telegram telling her that her husband Dickie is missing, presumed dead, she does not weep, or crumble. Instead, she feels a freedom that she’s not felt since her wedding day, the day her husband’s eyes didn’t light up when he saw her walk down the aisle. She wishes she could tell someone the truth about her marriage, but she is too ashamed to share the secrets hidden behind their black front door. Now she is free to live her life, even as the skies above London darken with enemy planes. She doesn’t think about what will happen if Dickie returns…

Vibrant and scrappy Maggie McCleod tried not to get fired from her wartime orchestra, but her sharp tongue landed her in trouble, so an overseas adventure with the USO’s camp show promises a chance at a fresh start. Wealthy and elegant Catherine Duquette signs with the USO to leave behind her restrictive life of privilege and to uncover the truth behind the disappearance of the handsome pilot whose letters mysteriously stopped arriving. The two women are joined by an eclectic group of performers.

Working in a museum under a false identity is Brigitte’s only hope. Until she meets Isabelle Valette, who confides in hushed tones that she is part of the Resistance. And when her new friend tells her of a train leaving Paris that can take children to safety, Brigitte knows her daughter must be on it, even if it breaks her heart. But getting Sophie onto the train is dangerous. If they are caught smuggling a Jewish child out of Paris, they will be killed. And with the enemy closing in, can Brigitte get her beloved daughter to safety before it is too late?

1915, London: Working in the dusty bookshop that her Aunt Violet mysteriously inherited, Hannah Merrill is accustomed to finding twists in every tale. But discovering her beloved best friend Lily-Anne – with a paperknife through her heart – in the middle of the bookshop, is not a plotline she saw coming. The case is anything but textbook. With the discovery of a coded German message, and Hannah’s instinct that Lily-Anne’s husband is keeping secrets, she determines to get to the bottom of it. She can’t do it alone though.

Five women come together at a New Year's Eve's party after decades apart, in this thrilling story of desire, revenge and courage, based on a brave group of Australian and British WWII servicewomen Burma, 1945. Bea, Plum, Bubbles, Joy and Lucy: five young women in search of adventure, attached to the Fourteenth Army, fighting a forgotten war in the jungle. Assigned to run a mobile canteen, navigating treacherous roads and dodging hostile gunfire, they become embroiled in life-threatening battles of their own. Battles that will haunt the women for the rest of their lives.

When Betty Palmer's sister dies under suspicious circumstances whilst landing her Tiger Moth, Betty and three other women pilots of the Air Transport Auxiliary in WWII England unite to discover who killed her and why. Estranged from her family, Penny Blake wants simply to belong. American Doris Winter, running from a personal tragedy, yearns for a new start. Naturally shy Mary Whitworth-Baines struggles to fit in. Together, though, they are a force to be reckoned with as they face the mystery that confronts them.

“Moving… This engrossing and hopeful story will hold readers from start to finish.”—Publishers Weekly “Family secrets, complex characters and a glorious setting make The Inheritance a rich, compelling read...JoAnn Ross at her best!” —Sherryl Woods, #1 New York Times bestselling...

On the eve of the return of the British Crown Colony of Hong Kong to China in 1997, young Ophelia asks her peculiar great-aunt Violet about the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong during World War II, the disappearance of her uncle Raymond, and whether her grandmother, Emily, was a murderer. Emily’s marriage—three times—to her father’s mortal enemy causes a stir among three very different Hong Kong Chinese families. But the bickering around the scandal of Emily’s marriage is violently disrupted by the Japanese Imperial Army’s invasion of Hong Kong on Christmas Day, 1941.

Wartime intrigue spans the lives of three women—past and present—in this emotional novel from the acclaimed author of The Last Year of the War. February, 1946. World War Two is over, but the recovery from the most intimate of its horrors has only just begun for Annaliese Lange, a German...

1939. Viola Baxter and Fred Scholtz planned to start their new lives together. But Fred is half German and, with war fast approaching, he must travel to Germany to bring his sister home. But that journey is enough for others to suspect him...and Viola. When Annie Scholz heard her beloved grandmother was seriously ill, she wasted no time rushing to Germany to be by her side. She didn't realise it meant she would not be able to return home to the UK.

Sometimes the past won't stay hidden, it demands to be uncovered. The Forgotten Life of Arthur Pettinger is a moving story from best-selling author Suzanne Fortin. Arthur Pettinger's memory isn't what it used to be. He can't always remember the names of his grandchildren, where he lives or which way round his slippers go. He does remember Maryse though, a woman he hasn't seen for decades, but whose face he will never forget.

Beautifully read by Indira Varma and poignantly told, Marking Time is the second novel in Elizabeth Jane Howard’s bestselling family saga The Cazalet Chronicles, set during the onset of World War II. 'Compelling, moving, unputdownable . . . Maybe my favourite books ever' - Marian Keyes...

The Second World War has finally ended and so begins a new era of freedom and opportunity for the Cazalet family in Casting Off, the fourth novel in Elizabeth Jane Howard's magnificent Cazalet Chronicles. Read by Indira Varma (Game of Thrones, Luther and Oedipus at The Old Vic). 'Compelling...

There was rarely a time when Phoenix Yuan-Whyller’s mother, Rain, didn’t live with her. Even when Phoenix got married, Rain, who followed her from China to Toronto, came to share Phoenix’s life. Now at the age of eighty-three, Rain’s unexpected death ushers in a heartrending separation.

Calliope Adham—young, strong-willed, and recently widowed—is schoolmistress in the village of Molyvos when Hitler's army invades Greece in 1941. Well-read and linguistically gifted, she is recruited by the Germans to act as their liaison officer. It is the beginning of a personal and national saga that will last for several decades. Calliope's wartime duties bring her into close contact with Lieutenant Lorenz Umbreit, the Wehrmacht commander. The schoolmistress is an active member of the Greek Resistance, yet her friendship with the German blossoms against all odds.

From the author of The Secret Society of Salzburg comes a powerful and moving story of bravery and resilience in World War II Paris and one woman who must face impossible choices to survive… Paris, 1940 German tanks rumble through the streets of Paris, forcing frightened citizens to flee. But...

Set in the height of the Second World War, The Cazalet Chronicles continues with the third in the series, Confusion, where chaos has become a way of life for the Cazalet family. Read by Indira Varma (Game of Thrones, Luther and Oedipus at The Old Vic) 'Compelling, moving, unputdownable...