Judy Astley

Brought to you by Penguin. Every July, the lucky owners of Cornish holiday homes set off for their annual break. They close up their desirable semis in smartish London suburbs - having turned off the Aga and turned on the burglar alarm - and look forward to a carefree, restful, somehow more...

After 20 years of marriage, Nina had offloaded serial philanderer Joe and was happy enough. But into Nina's new, carefree life some disturbing elements began to appear....

Sara’s mother told her that she shouldn’t marry Conrad – that the twenty-five-year age gap between them would tell in the end. The end is now (apparently) approaching fast....

Imagine – you’re in your early 30s, settled and sensible, and wanting to move up the property ladder. Your parents – approaching retirement – have an ENORMOUS house which is, let’s be honest, a bit tatty but worth squillions. Only your teenage sister Sorrel lives there now and she’s...

Stella works as an agony aunt for a teenage magazine. She lives on Pansy Island, a self-consciously arty community on the Thames, where her husband Adrian writes erotic novels in a summerhouse by the river, while her two teenage children prepare themselves for adult life in various ways not...

Melanie finds herself single again after years of being one half of a couple. Her friends predict loneliness, frustration, disaster. Her parents are convinced she’s a failure in life. But Melanie is overwhelmingly excited to be able to do her own thing – she plans a programme of behaving...

A Proper Family Holiday was the last thing Lucy was expecting to have. But as a penniless and partnerless house-painter with an expired lease on her flat and a twelve-year-old daughter, she could hardly turn down her parents' offer to take them on a once-in-a-lifetime trip to the Caribbean...

Alice has a scrupulously organised, comfortable life in West London with Noel - her second husband, whose main ambition in life is to sharpen his golf handicap in time for retirement. But Alice’s once-famous bohemian mother, Jocelyn, residing in shabby splendour in a crumbling house on a...

Thea hat an Weihnachten vor einem Jahr in Cornwall den unwiderstehlichen Sean kennengelernt und sich Hals über Kopf in ihn verliebt...

Nein, nicht schnulzig, sondern richtig schön romantisch! Schließlich ist bald Weihnachten... Theas Eltern wollen die ganze Familie zu Weihnachten...

Jess has just waved goodbye to her darling son, off backpacking to Oz. She's left with two teenage daughters and husband Matt - all of whom find themselves regularly featured in her popular and light-hearted newspaper column in which she conveys to her readers an enviably cheery muddle of family...

Brought to you by Penguin. Let bestselling author Judy Astley sweep you away with this insightful and uplifting gem of a novel about the important things in life. Perfect for fans of Jenny Colgan, Milly Johnson and Trisha Ashley. "Astley writes with humour and insight about the stresses and...

Bella has given up on men. Happily divorced, her latest boyfriend just omitted to tell her about his current wife, so she’s back on her own again. Then her ex-husband turns up....

Have you ever wondered what your ex is up to? When Nell was a student, she and Patrick were a serious item. They were inseparable, and she really thought he was The One. But then Alex came along....

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...

Do the friendships you make on holiday have anything to do with real life? It might be sensible to hope that they don’t. For the last few years, Beth and Ned have gone to the same Caribbean island to the same luxury spa hotel. There they meet the same crowd, and take up where they left off...

Big and beautiful? Or thin and miserable? Jay has always envied her cousin Delphine. While Jay was brought up in a large, noisy, and chaotic family, Delphine was indulged, perfectly dressed with a co-ordinated bedroom, an immaculate wardrobe, dancing lessons, and monogrammed silver-backed...