Showing results by narrator "Hannah Curtis" in All Categories

For fans of Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train, an electrifying thriller that will take you into the dark spaces that exist between a husband and a wife. When the police started asking questions, Jean Taylor turned into a different woman. One who enabled her and her husband to carry on, when more bad things began to happen... But that woman’s husband died last week. And Jean doesn’t have to be her anymore. There’s a lot Jean hasn’t said over the years about the crime her husband was suspected of committing.

After escaping a bad relationship, Jess Cavendish is running and leaving it all behind, carrying just a few treasured belongings in her knapsack. She needs to start over, but that means sleeping where she can and making the most of her slim savings. Luckily, she comes across a recently sold, unoccupied house. It couldn’t hurt to stay there while she saves up enough to get her own place, right?

The period from 1933 to 1943 was one of the darkest and most chaotic in human history, as the Second World War unfolded with unthinkable cruelty. It was also a crucial decade in the dramatic, intersecting lives of some of history’s greatest philosophers. There were four women, in particular, whose parallel ideas would come to dominate the twentieth century—at once in necessary dialogue and in striking contrast with one another.

On the morning of December 26, 2004, on the southern coast of Sri Lanka, Sonali Deraniyagala lost her parents, her husband, and her two young sons in the tsunami she miraculously survived. In this brave and searingly frank memoir, she describes those first horrifying moments and her long journey since. She has written an engrossing, unsentimental, beautifully poised account: as she struggles through the first months following the tragedy, furiously clenched against a reality that she cannot face and cannot deny....

Rose has just turned 40 when she gets a call from a lawyer asking her to come to Kyoto for the reading of her estranged father’s will. And so, for the first time in her life, she finds herself in Japan, where Paul, her father’s assistant, is waiting to greet her.As Paul guides Rose along a mysterious itinerary designed by her deceased father, her bitterness and anger are soothed by the stones and the trees in the Zen gardens they move through.

When Lizzie’s car crashes with her two daughters inside, she faces a terrible choice. And when she recovers from her injuries, she must deal with the impact of that tragedy and the police investigation into it. As Lizzie and her family struggle to come to terms with the events of that night, things take an even darker turn. What exactly happened on that remote country road? Who is responsible? And can the family get through this together…or will the truth finally tear them apart?

Owls have existed for over sixty million years, and in the relatively short time we have shared the planet with these majestic birds they have ignited the human imagination. But even as owls continue to captivate our collective consciousness, celebrated British nature writer Miriam Darlington finds herself struck by all she doesn't know about the true nature of these enigmatic creatures.

The two oldest Dashwood sisters approach romance differently. One impulsively jumps into love while the other is far more prudent. When tragedy strikes they find themselves searching for suitable husbands. Elinor feels ill-equipped to compete with the self-centred, fortune-driven society she finds herself in, whilst Marianne's unshakeable belief in her own feelings makes her susceptible to the designs of unscrupulous men. Can they find true love?

Thirty-three years ago two little girls disappeared from a notorious run-down neighborhood in south London. One was found dead within a few days; the body of the other was never discovered. Today, the man convicted of murder three decades ago is back on the streets, and another girl vanishes. Hard-nosed investigative journalist Angela Tate reported on the old case and is back to cover the new story, determined to persuade the mother of the missing girl, Trisha Collins, to reveal a secret she’s been keeping about the original killing. But Trisha is terrified and refuses to talk.

Verity finds out her mother is secretly dating a man she met online. After five long years of widowhood, Eleanor is finally happy—and back to her old self. Verity thinks he's after her money and her smart Cirencester townhouse. Her mother thinks that Verity just can't let her move on.

Helen Grant is a mystery to her daughter. An extrovert with few friends who has sought intimacy in the wrong places, a twice-divorced mother of two now living alone surrounded by her memories, Helen (known to her acquaintances as “Hen”) has always haunted Bridget. Now, Bridget is an academic in her forties. She sees Helen once a year, and considers the problem to be contained. As she looks back on their tumultuous relationship—the performances and small deceptions—she tries to reckon with the cruelties inflicted on both sides.

Anna Ogilvy was a budding twenty-five-year-old writer with a bright future. Then, one night, she stabbed two people to death with no apparent motive—and she hasn’t woken up since. Dubbed “Sleeping Beauty” by the tabloids, Anna suffers from a rare psychosomatic disorder known to neurologists as “resignation syndrome.” Dr. Benedict Prince is a forensic psychologist and an expert in the field of sleep-related homicides. His methods represent the last possible hope of solving the infamous “Anna O” case by waking Anna up so she can stand trial.

The German occupation is over. The Channel Islands, the only captured territory within the British Isles, are finally liberated. But the people of Jersey are left as scarred as the landscape. No longer a “summerland” holiday paradise, the island now boils with tension as locals seek revenge on anyone suspected of collaborating with the enemy during the war. Nineteen-year-old Jean Parris, still adjusting to this fractious peace, is shocked to learn that Hazel, a teacher who lives over her dad’s shop, may be responsible for her father’s wartime arrest.

A stunning debut novel from the Northern Irish poet Eoghan Walls, The Gospel of Orla is the coming-of-age story of a young girl, Orla, and the man she meets who has an astonishing and unique ability.

Commissioned by the Amsterdam Surgeons’ Guild, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp was the first major Rembrandt work to catapult the young painter to international fame. Taking this painting as its inspiration, Nina Siegal’s novel The Anatomy Lesson opens on the morning of the medical dissection and follows several characters as they prepare for the evening’s big event:

It’s 1830s England, and Culinarians—doyens who consult with society’s elite to create gorgeous food and confections—are the crème de la crème of high society. Helena Higgins, top of her class at the Royal Academy, has a sharp demeanor and an even sharper palate—and knows stardom awaits her if she can produce greatness in her final year. Penelope Pickering is going to prove the value of non-European cuisine to all of England. Her contemporaries may scorn her Filipina heritage and her dishes, but with her flawless social graces and culinary talents, Penelope is set to prove them wrong.

When a landslide on the Jurassic Coast reveals a rare "dragon" dinosaur, best friends Kat Wolfe and Harper Lamb are thrilled, especially when stars and scientists come flocking to sleepy Bluebell Bay. But after they begin investigating a suspicious death, events spiral quickly out of control for detectives Wolfe and Lamb. Worse still, Kat’s wild cat is in trouble. Can they solve the mystery—and save the cat’s life—before it’s too late?

After a break-in at their London home, Kat Wolfe and her veterinarian mum decide it’s time to move to the country. Dr. Wolfe’s new job on England’s Jurassic Coast comes with a condition: they have to adopt Tiny, a huge Savannah who resists Kat’s best attempts at cat whispering. Kat starts a pet-sitting agency to make pocket money, but then the owner of her first client, an Amazon parrot, vanishes from his gadget-filled mansion. 

Kim Slade is at work when there's a knock at her office door. Someone is waiting for her in reception. A woman claiming to be her mother. The mother who abandoned her thirty years ago. Monica Slade has been working as a live-in housekeeper for a judge and his wife, she says. But now Judge Hawkes is dead. The last thing Monica says before the police take her in for questioning is: "There are things you should know. About the past."

Jennifer Cole has just been told that she has a terminal blood disorder and has just three months to live - 90 days to say goodbye to friends and family, and to put her affairs in order. Ninety days to come to terms with a diagnosis that is unfair, unexpected, and completely unpronounceable. Focusing on the positives (she won't have to go on in a world without Bowie or Maya Angelou; she won't get Alzheimer's or Parkinson's like her parents, or have teeth that flop out at the mere mention of the word apple), Jennifer realizes she only has one real regret.