Ceylon, 1906: Stella Polegate steps off the ship in Colombo harbour, her heart beating with contradictory emotions. As her father’s unofficial research assistant, she’s thrilled to explore this island of ancient temples and verdant tea plantations—yet painfully aware that her brilliant...

English hairdresser, Ethel, is alone after the deaths of her family and her wartime fiancé. Widow and single mother, Alice, bringing up two daughters, receives an unexpected inheritance. War bride, Joan, is mother to three children with a fourth on the way and money in short supply....

Sixteen-year-old Jasmine Barrington hates everything about living in Kenya and longs to return to the island of Penang in British colonial Malaya where she was born....

After Penang is attacked by the Japanese at the end of 1941, Mary Helston believes Singapore will be a safe haven. But within weeks, the supposedly invincible British stronghold is on the brink of collapse to the advancing enemy....

Evie Fraser, paid companion to a crotchety spinster, seems destined for a lonely life. Then, out of the blue, a marriage proposal arrives by post. She met the handsome Douglas Barrington just once - at his wedding - but never forgot him....

Hampshire, 1916: Alice traces her hand over the cold glass of the window as the pale morning light slips into the empty room. The pain of loss is worse than a physical one. Reminders of Edmund are all around her. The coldness of the sheet on the other half of the bed. The unrelenting silence in...

In this heart-wrenching and utterly spellbinding story of love and artistic ambition, a young woman fights to be true to herself in a world where duty, money and class jeopardise her dreams. England, 1908: Alice Dalton never intended to rebel against her aristocratic parents. But after her...

A gripping and unputdownable story of love, sacrifice and torn family loyalties during the turmoil of WW1. July, 1914: In their sunlit Hampshire workshop, Alice Dalton mixes paints for the stained-glass artwork she and Edmund are working on, pausing only to joyfully cradle the soft swell of...

Three powerful novels from a prize-winning storyteller Set before, during, and after World War 2 on the beautiful Far Eastern island of Penang, these books and their memorable characters will keep you up all night listening. The Pearl of Penang - Evie's Story Winner of the 2020 BookBrunch...

Life looks rosy for Jack when he lands the teaching job he's always dreamed of and meets the love of his life, Eliza Hewlett. But his world is shattered when Mary Ellen, his landlord's daughter, falsely accuses him of fathering the child she is expecting....

They faced up to the challenges of war - but can they deal with the troubles of peace? Canadian Jim Armstrong married in haste during the Second World War after a one-night stand. When his wife and their small son join him in Canada, it's four years since they've seen each other. War...

Two troubled people in a turbulent world In July 1940, Gwen Collingwood drops her husband at the railway station, knowing she may never see him again. Two days later, her humdrum world is torn apart when her sleepy English seaside town is subjected to the first of many heavy bombing attacks. In...

When Elizabeth Morton's father asks her to travel to the other side of the world to marry a man she's never met, she is stunned. It's 1920 and a woman has rights. But her choices are removed when she is raped by her brother-in-law and thrown out of her own home by her sister....