Showing results by narrator "Patricia Gallimore" in All Categories

Cornwall, 1920s. Beth Tresaile has been happily reconciled with her estranged mother for over a year and is looking forward to her best friend Kitty Copeland spending Christmas with them. But Kitty’s request that her brother Stuart join them throws Beth in turmoil for Stuart and Beth were once lovers, and she lives in fear of her friend discovering her secret shame. But Stuart’s arrival sets in motion events that even Beth could not have expected….

Actress Vena Burford is 'resting' between jobs. But needs must, and with few voice-over jobs in the pipeline, Vena takes on a few jobs for friends and family around the idyllic Stratford-Upon-Avon. But interior design leads her to violent threats and showing prospective buyers around houses ushers in a drug-smuggling ring. Vena comes to know all too well that the countryside is far from quiet.

In 1849, the Poltraze Estate has been deserted by Squire Nankervis, and 16-year-old Clemency Kivell is stunned when her father, Seth, announces that he wants to buy it. Trespassing in the abandoned big house, rebel-in-spirit Clemency encounters Kingsley Faraday, who tells her he’s bought Poltraze, but will not be the new squire.

When firemen are called to an intense blaze at the Grange in Melverley, they find the bodies of Christie Barton, her daughter, Adelaide, and father-in-law, William, along with evidence that suggests the fire was started deliberately. Detective Inspector Alex Randall enlists the help of coroner Martha Gunn, but the puzzle deepens with a second house fire - the occupant, retired nurse Monica Deverill, is missing. Where is she, and what links the two fires? The answers lie in a secret buried in the past…

Dorset, 1917: If it’s not enough that a girl from a good background is forced to work as a maid, Livia Carr is then violated by the master of the house and becomes pregnant. Her only course is to marry the son of the house, Richard Sangster, a World War One hero who has returned home an invalid. He is not expected to live, and he offers Livia and the child legitimacy, as well as his name and estate. Livia grows to love Richard, and his death comes as a great blow to her. Into the breach steps Livia’s frist love, and Richard’s friend, Denton Elliot. But will he desert her when the secret of the child’s parentage is revealed to him?

As the Second World War ends, Faye Harvey struggles against the stigma of being a single mother. Then Mark Fuller, badly ravaged by his POW experiences in the Far East, arrives in Cornwall. Faye finds herself drawn to him - but the father of her son, a Scottish laird, turns up, offering marriage now that his wife is dead.

Set in the 1770s, the latest book in the Pengarron series focuses on the long-standing, complex relationship between Kerensa Pengarron, beautiful wife of Sir Oliver, and her first love, Clem Trenchard: a man whom she has tried, unsuccessfully, to forget. The christening of little Harry Pengarron brings old scores to light, as Oliver and Clem meet face to face for the first time in years.

It's a busy weekend for Lina: she wins a dance competition, annoys a valuable client and has to play gooseberry when Griff, her business partner, meets an old flame. Killing time, she drives across Dartmoor only to find two men robbing a medieval church. Outraged, she manages to stop them - only to discover that it's not just in Devon that they are working. Safely back in Kent, she makes some new friends.

Newly retired, ex-chief superintendent Fran Harman and her partner, Mark, have volunteered to assist West Mercia police in reinvestigating an unsolved crime. Twenty years ago a car was found abandoned on an isolated forest road running, its hazard lights still flashing, the passenger door open. In the back were two child seats. One was empty; in the other lay a desperately ill baby. Neither the baby's mother nor the elder child were ever seen again.

Margot Asquith was perhaps the most daring and unconventional Prime Minister's wife in British history. Known for her wit, style and habit of speaking her mind, she transformed 10 Downing Street into a glittering social and intellectual salon. Yet her last five years at Number 10 were a period of intense emotional and political turmoil in her private and public life.

In the peaceful setting of the National Trust near Church Stretton, Tracey Walsh drives herself and her four-year-old daughter, Daisy, up the remote Burway in the early hours of the morning, tragically loses control of her car and crashes into the valley below. Tracey is rushed to hospital, but where is Daisy? She has vanished, provoking an intense police search of the area around the Devil’s Chair – land that is rife with legends and stories of witchcraft, sorcery and unexplained disappearances.

Jessica Trenchard is a spirited and, at times, wayward girl - to the point that her father, Clem, is considering remarrying, just to provide her with a suitable role model. But Jessica's tender care of the distressed and speechless girl she discovers in a field shows that she isn't just a fun-loving tomboy. Her compassion touches the heart of Kane Pengerran, eldest son of the Trenchards' landlord, who has reasons for his own for desiring the love of a sensitive woman.

Kerensa Trelynne's plans to wed her sweetheart, Clem Trenchard, are ruined when Sir Oliver Pengarron makes her grandfather, and guardian, an offer for Trelynne Cove - the land on which Old Tom's cottage stands. Old Tom is wily, and to ensure a secure and stable future for his precious granddaughter, he makes her part of the price for the Cove: Sir Oliver must marry Kerensa.

Free-spirited Clemency Kivell is proud of achieving ownership of a music shop in the industrial village of Meryen. The village’s young squire Matthew Faraday, who’s in love with Clemency, decides to hold a May Day festival. However, the event is spoiled – first for Clemency, when her cousin Jowan proposes to her and takes offence at her rejection, and next for Matthew himself, when he and Clemency argue.

A bloody gang war has erupted in the World Heritage designated city of Bath, leading DCI James Carrick to enlist the help of his old friends, husband and wife team Patrick Gillard and Ingrid Langley, late of MI5 and now working for the Serious Organized Crime Agency, to hunt down the criminals. One for the country’s most notorious and feared crime lords, “Uncle”, is spotted in the city, and they are soon embroiled in a dangerous game of cat and mouse to catch him and his gang.

To decide to holiday in Bath, when you live not ten miles down the road, might be regarded as eccentric – but Ingrid Langley and her husband and colleague Patrick Gillard, badly need a break. Patrick is recovering from being seriously ill, and Ingrid is getting over having a baby. Although the holiday proceeds sedately enough, trouble, their old friend, is never far away.

Callum Hughes has been labelled a killer and a psycho - by the press, by his classmates and by the family of the boy he stabbed. Roger Gough has been labelled a victim. He is described by everyone as a sporty, funny, and popular boy who was brutally murdered by Callum. But things are rarely so black and white.

It was Heather's silver wedding anniversary. But this important milestone did not mark her marriage to Tom, her often-absent airline pilot husband and father of their two teenage children. It was for her first marriage - a wildly romantic, secret affair, when she and Iain - 12 years older than her and the heir to a Scottish baronetcy - had eloped immediately after her final school speech day. She was just 16 at the time.

After a tragic miscarriage, Beth Tresaile returns to Owles House, the place of her miserable childhood, accompanied by her best friend, Kitty Copeland. Beth feels she can no longer go on unless she gets revenge on her estranged mother, Christina, who abandoned her on a cold winter’s night. But there are many shocks in store for Beth, who discovers that much of her childhood was built on deception. Kitty is captivated with Cornwall and Beth reluctantly - but later gladly - becomes involved with the locals.

1949: one year in the childhood of Candida Lycett Green in the remote village of Farnborough in Berkshire. Here she lives with her father John Betjeman and her mother Penelope Chetwode, in one of the bleakest and highest spots on the windswept downland.Candida runs wild with the 'gang' of village children. Stimulated by regular excursions to the cinema in Wantage, Candida and her best friend June became fascinated by the idea of love.