Showing titles in Coming of Age

Pen knows her divorced parents back in Canada are hiding something from her. She believes she'll find the answer here in Scotland, where an old friend of her father's - now a famous writer known as Lord Lennox - lives. When she is invited to spend the weekend at Lennox's centuries-old estate with his enveloping, fascinating family, Pen begins to unravel her parents' secret, just as she's falling in love for the first time . . .

Ailish Ryan has been in hiding since her husband’s affair ended their marriage. But when a friend forces her to face her new reality, will she choose to revisit the past or embrace a brand-new future? Ailish’s daughter, Emmy, thought her boyfriend was nothing like her cheating father, but now she’s not so sure. As the hours pass, she turns detective to find out if she picked the right man, or if history is repeating itself.

The heartbreaking and compelling new audiobook set in a Victorian workhouse from the author of The Orphans of Halfpenny Street. When Lucy and her brother, Joshua, are orphaned, it falls to Joshua to provide for them both, but he is barely into his teens and, in his naivety, falls prey to bad influences and drink. Lucy is desperate to avoid the workhouse, but when Joshua loses their meagre savings they are thrown out onto the street, and, in dire poverty, it isn’t long before Lucy finds herself at its gates - almost a fate worse than death.

With Christmas approaching, the Brogan family of London's East End are braving the horrors of the Blitz. With the men away fighting for King and Country and the ever-present dangers of the German Luftwaffe's nightly reign of death and destruction, the family must do all they can to keep a stiff upper lip. For Jo, the youngest of the Brogan sisters, the perils of war also offer a newfound freedom. Jo falls in love with Tommy, a man known for his dangerous reputation as much as his charm.

With epic breadth and intimate detail, Ludmila Ulitskaya's remarkable work tells the story of three school friends who meet in Moscow in the 1950s and go on to embody the heroism, folly, compromise, and hope of the Soviet dissident experience. These three boys - an orphaned poet; a gifted, fragile pianist; and a budding photographer with a talent for collecting secrets - struggle to reach adulthood in a society where their heroes have been censored and exiled.

After her parents moved her and her brother to America, Preeti Desai never meant to tear her family apart. All she did was fall in love with a white Christian carnivore instead of a conventional Indian boy. Years later, with her parents not speaking to her and her controversial relationship in tatters, all Preeti has left is her career at a prestigious Los Angeles law firm. But when Preeti receives word of a terrible accident in the city where she was born, she returns to India, where she’ll have to face her estranged parents...and the complicated past they left behind.

Faith Jackson fixes herself up with a great job in TV and the perfect flatshare. But neither is that perfect—and nor are her relations with her overbearing, though always loving, family. Furious and perplexed when her parents announce their intention to retire back home to Jamaica, Faith makes her own journey there, where she is immediately welcomed by Aunt Coral, keeper of a rich cargo of family history.

Against the unforgiving landscape of a hospital, I fell in love with a mischievous, sun-eyed boy who became my only joy in that desolate place. That’s what made it all the more soul-crushing when he committed suicide in front of me. Since then, I've sworn never to love anyone again. With three exceptions: My friends, Sony, Neo, and Coeur, a little gang of rebellious, dying kids. Sony leads the charge, Neo, a bad-tempered and wheel-chaired writer, keeps track of our great deeds from and Coeur is the beautiful boy, the muscle, the gentle giant with a failing heart.

Sonea knows the other novices in the Magicians' Guild all come from powerful families, but she also knows she can turn to Rothen and Dannyl for help when she needs it. Promoted to Guild Ambassador, Lord Dannyl leaves for the Elyne court. His first order from Administrator Lorlen is to resume, in secret, High Lord Akkarin's long-abandoned research into ancient magical knowledge. Not knowing the true reason for his journey, Dannyl is soon facing unexpected dangers.

The four Bliss siblings have a loving but complicated bond, but when their mother, Dorothy, dies seemingly without a will, this relationship is put to the test. As the mourning siblings try to make sense of the situation, one of them is caught with a secret: before she died, Dorothy entrusted her favourite daughter with her will and a letter - and told her to destroy them both. But what Anna finds in the documents could change everything. Do the other siblings not deserve to know what it is about them that their mother was so desperate to hide?

Savannah "Sav" Henry is almost the person she wants to be, or at least she's getting closer. It’s the second semester of her sophomore year. She’s finally come out as bisexual, is making friends with the other queers in her dorm, and has just about recovered from her disastrous first queer “situationship.” She is cautiously optimistic that her life is about to begin.

Bound together by a single ancient text, the unforgettable characters of Cloud Cuckoo Land are dreamers and outsiders figuring out the world around them: 13-year-old Anna and Omeir, an orphaned seamstress and a cursed boy, on opposite sides of the formidable city walls during the 1453 siege of Constantinople; teenage idealist Seymour and octogenarian Zeno in an attack on a public library in present-day Idaho; and Konstance, decades from now, who turns to the oldest stories to guide her community in peril.

Two weeks, four friends and one big bucket list of secrets to unravel. Val Murray and her best friend, Josie, had been planning a ‘Thelma and Louise’ bucket-list-style holiday. Now Josie is gone, and Val needs to make the trip before it’s too late. But Val doesn’t want to do it alone, so she enlists the help of her nieces, Carly and Carole, and their best pal, Jess, who jump at the chance to join Val on a trip of a lifetime. What Val doesn’t realise is that Carly, Carole and Jess are all at turning points in their own lives, nursing crushing secrets, lies and betrayals.

Beginning in 1950s Liverpool, Violet's Children is a warm and nostalgic story of a young woman who must adopt her sister's children after tragedy strikes.

So how did I get myself into this situation, you ask? Simple: desperation. When you're faced with being homeless and hungry or taking off your clothes for money, the choice is easier than you'd imagine. That doesn't make it simple, though. Oh no. I hate it, in fact. There's nothing I'd like more than to quit and never go into another bar again, never hear the techno beat pulsing in my ears again, never feel the lecherous gazes of horny men again. Then, one day, I meet a man. He's in my club, front and center. He watches me do my routine, and his gaze is full of hunger.

An unnamed young trans woman grows up in a working-class suburb that has no place for her. She discovers community and kinship in downtown Madrid, amid a dazzling party scene animated by charming junkies, glamorous pop divas, and fallen angels. With each step she takes forward in the city, she finds herself confronted by an antagonism she does not yet know how to counter. In this thrilling and yet often frightening place each decision can have the highest of stakes and yet she knows that only she can forge a path forward to the life she truly wants to live.

Growing up in New York City in the 1910s, Luella and Effie Tildon realize that even as wealthy young women, their freedoms come with limits. But when the sisters discover a shocking secret about their father, Luella, the brazen elder sister, becomes emboldened to do as she pleases. Her rebellion comes with consequences, and one morning Luella is mysteriously gone.

From the Sunday Times best-selling author of The Queen's Choice. A tale of treachery, power-hungry families and legal subterfuges. Woven through it is a remarkable story of a beautiful girl, desirable as a bride, growing to be a woman of foresight and power. A story of love and loyalty and of the cost of personal ambition. The story of the woman who would ultimately wield power as the King Mother to 10-year-old King Richard II.

Amjad cradles his baby daughter in the middle of the night. He has no time to mourn his wife’s death. Saahil and Zahra, his two small children, are relying on him. Amjad vows to love and protect them always. Years later, Saahil and his best friend, Ehsan, have finished university and are celebrating with friends. But when the night turns dangerous, its devastating effects will ripple through the years to come. Zahra’s world is alight with politics and activism. But she is now her father’s only source of comfort, and worries she’ll never have time for her own aspirations.

Morgan Flowers just wants to hide. Raised by their neurodivergent father, Morgan has grown up haunted by the absence of their mysterious mother, Zoe, especially now, as they navigate their gender identity and the turmoil of first love. Their father, Julian, has raised Morgan with care, but he can’t quite fill the gap left by the dazzling and destructive Zoe, who fled to Europe on Morgan’s first birthday. And when Zoe is dumped by her girlfriend Brigid, she suddenly comes crashing back into Morgan and Julian’s lives.