Showing results by author "Deborah Moggach" in All Categories

Seventeenth-century Amsterdam is a city in the grip of tulip mania, basking in the wealth it has generated. Sophia’s husband Cornelis, an ageing merchant, is among those grown rich from this exotic new flower. To celebrate, he commissions a talented young artist to paint him with his young bride. But as the portrait grows, so does the passion between Sophia and the painter; and as ambitions, desires and dreams breed an intricate deception, their reckless gamble propels their lives towards a thrilling and tragic conclusion.

When Ravi Kapoor, an overworked London doctor, is driven beyond endurance by his disgusting and difficult father-in-law, he asks his wife: "Can't we just send him away somewhere? Somewhere far, far away." His prayer seems to have been answered when his entrepreneurial cousin, Sonny, sets up a retirement home, recreating a lost corner of England in a converted guesthouse in Bangalore.

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. Now there's just a dip on one side of the bed and no one to fill it. In a daze, Pru goes off to a friend's funeral. Usual old hymns, words of praise and a eulogy but...it doesn't sound like the friend Pru knew. And it isn't. She's gone to the wrong service.

From the best-selling author of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and Tulip Fever, a deliciously funny, poignant and wry novel, full of surprising twists and turns. 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. But as James regales his family with tales of Mandy's virtues, their shopping trips and the shared pleasure of their journeys to garden centres, Phoebe and Robert sense something is amiss.

It is the year 1916, and pretty young Eithne Clay runs a shabby but genteel South London boarding house while her husband is off at war. Her 14-year old son Ralph dotes on his mother, but has adolescent thoughts he'd rather hide from her. Winnie, the young maid, is a homely, good-hearted country girl, rejected by Archie, the cheeky butcher's boy before he too is called up. And when the dreaded telegram arrives at the house, things turn from difficult to desperate for the two young women....

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, and even in her sixties she’s still capable of getting it disastrously wrong. But then she falls in love with Jeremy, an old chum visiting from abroad. The fatal catch? Jeremy is her best friend’s husband. But just as Petra is beginning to relax into her happy ever after, she finds herself catapulted to West Africa and to Bev, her best friend whom she’s been betraying so spectacularly.

The irrepressible Russell "Buffy" Buffery has upped sticks from London and moved to Knockton, Powys, to a B&B inherited from an old flame. With his future spread before him, and a string of failed marriages behind him, Buffy decides it's time for a new challenge. Meanwhile: Harold's wife has run off with a younger woman leaving him alone with his as-yet-unwritten novel narrated by Mary Pickford's cat; Amy's weedy boyfriend has turned out to be not so needy after all; and Andy's partner's corset-and-suspender-clad attempts at seduction are having anything but the desired effect.

Meet Buffy. With three ex-wives, a failing career and only his dog, George, for company, Buffy's bachelorhood is looking worryingly confirmed. Until he meets Celeste. Dazzled by love, Buffy has no idea that Celeste is systematically researching his ex-wives, children, and step-children, and unearthing secrets that will change all their lives.

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. Now observe what happens to a family when they lose their house, their status, all their wealth. Note how they disintegrate under the pressures of guilt and poverty and are forced to confront their true selves.