Showing results by publisher "W. F. Howes Ltd" in Women's Fiction

When single attorney Steven Creed becomes guardian of an orphaned five-year-old boy, he trades his big-city law firm for a ranch near Stone Creek, Arizona. Taking care of little Matt and fixing up his ranch house loosens something tightly wound inside him. But when Steven takes on the pro bono defence of a local teen, he meets his match in the opposing counsel - beautiful, by-the-book county prosecutor Melissa O'Ballivan.

When Audrey makes a devastating discovery about her husband, she is forced to re-examine everything she thought she knew about their forty-year marriage. Their children will soon have to come to terms with this unsettling secret, but for the meantime, they are trying to cope with their own dilemmas.

Caught as a teenager at a wild party, and sent home in disgrace, Lucy Sheridan is finally returning to Summer River 13 years later. Lucy now works for a private investigation firm, and Summer River is now a trendy spot in California's wine country. Mason Fletcher, has changed, too, setting up a security firm of his own. But when he and Lucy make a shocking discovery inside her aunt’s house, Mason is determined to protect her.

The Funeral Cryer long ago accepted the mundane realities of her life: avoided by fellow villagers because of the stigma attached to her job as a professional mourner and under-appreciated by The Husband, whose fecklessness has pushed the couple close to the brink of break-up. But just when things couldn't be bleaker, The Funeral Cryer takes a leap of faith—and in so doing things start to take a surprising turn for the better.

Having married her childhood sweetheart, Riko now finds herself trapped in a relationship that has been soured by infidelity. One day, by chance, she runs into her old friend Mr. Takaoka, who offers friendship, love, and an unusual escape: he teaches her the trick of living inside her dreams. And so, each night, she sinks into another life: first as a high-ranking courtesan in the 17th century, and then as a serving lady to a princess in the late Middle Ages.

Connie Darke is trying to run away from the traumas in her past, and it's led her home, to the small rural council estate she left almost 20 years earlier. Matilda Reynolds has spent most of her long life in the Worcestershire village of Stonecastle, and she's content there, with her animals and her solitude. Until a fall lands her in hospital, and Matilda has to turn to her strange young neighbor Connie for help looking after her home. Out of their tentative arrangement, each woman gains a new sense of community.

Twenty-nine-year-old teacher Emily needs her father to believe her life is a success. He may have walked out on the family when she was a child and let her down when she needed him most, but her life is perfect despite him.

Written in his own words, and guided by a man who collects glasses in a local pub, this is the story of Herod 'Rod' Pinkney's search for Daisy Lamprich, a young woman he first sees on a decade-old episode of the Judge Judy Show and who he now intends to marry. When Daisy is located in the coastal city of Huntington Beach, California, he travels there with his good friend and next-door neighbour, Donald, a man who once fought in the tunnels of Cu Chi during the Vietnam War and who now spends most of his time in Herod's basement.

When Jennifer goes up to Cambridge University with her head full of the Romantic Poets, she never dreams that she will find her very own Byron. But then she meets gorgeous actor Laurie Lewis, and finds herself living a real-life love poem. Fifteen years and two children later, Jennifer and Laurie's relationship is starting to feel more like an epic tragedy. After a series of revelations turn her world upside down, Jennifer will do anything to keep her family together—even if it means moving hundreds of miles away to Laurie's childhood home in Westenbury, Yorkshire.

There are some things you can never leave behind… Kate Forrest is invisible…her husband doesn’t seem to know she’s alive and her two children have become stroppy adolescents. With her fortieth birthday approaching, Kate walks out of her life, and gets on a plane to Italy. With no responsibilities, she soon finds herself caught up in the arms of a man half her age. But eventually Kate will be forced to choose between her past and the future.

Emily Parker is set to have the worst Christmas ever! Her flatmate's moved out, she's closed her heart to love and she's been put in charge of the school original Christmas show - with zero musical ability. Disgraced superstar Ray Stone is in desperate need of a quick PR turnaround. Waking up from a drunken stupor to a class of 10-year-olds snapping pics and Emily looking at him was not what he had in mind. Ray needs Emily's help to delete the photos, and she needs his with the show. As they learn to work together they may just open their hearts to more than a second chance.

Grace Chapman has an enviable set-up, living comfortably with her husband on the Hudson River. Then Ted advertises for a new assistant, and Beth walks into their lives. Organized, passionate and eager to learn, Beth quickly makes herself indispensable to Ted and his family. But Grace soon begins to feel sidelined in her home - and her marriage - by this ambitious younger woman. Is Grace paranoid or is there more to Beth than there appears?

India’s family, her fiancé and the general medical establishment object to her position as a female doctor, but she insists on defying convention, finding a post in London's East End. There she meets a gang boss called Sid Malone. Criminal he may be, but he also has a hidden charm.... But Sid has a past and enemies, including India's ruthless fiancé, whose intention is to marry into the family money.

As the Bruschetti brothers' criminal empire has grown, they have relied on a complex web of financial arrangements to keep their business safe. Now wealthy and aging, they have decided to retire from crime. But when actor Harry Murphy overhears the Bruschettis plotting to kill several associates, he decides he must intervene. After warning one of the intended victims, Harry is caught up in the drama and enlisted by the British authorities to build a case against the Bruschettis.

In the summer of 1877, Bridget is orphaned when her unreliable father succumbs to a snakebite as they're crossing the Kansas prairie. Arriving in Dodge City as a penniless orphan, she's quickly recruited for work at the Buffalo Queen brothel and befriends her bookish mentor Constance, securing her home and employment as the favorite of Sheriff's Deputy Jim Bonnie. As winter creeps in from the plains, female gunfighter Spartan Lee rides into town, and Bridget falls in love with her the moment their paths cross.

Cressida is living the high life in 1960s London. Her father decrees that she must have her portrait painted to mark her upcoming marriage. When Cressida meets the painter Ralph, she knows her life will never be the same. In the present day, Emily is told of a mysterious legacy: a house in Cumbria left to her by a woman she has never met. Could this house provide the chance to start anew?

It begins with a singing and dancing septet in dusty church halls. But it is not the sisters’ dancing that fills the seats: it is the torrents of hair they let loose at the end of each show. And their hair will pull them out of poverty, to the salons of Dublin and the palazzi of Venice. It will bring some of them love and each of them loss. For their fame and fortune will come at a terrible price...

At 18 Angélique Latham is her father's closest, most trusted child, schooled in managing their grand estate. But when he dies, her half-brothers brutally turn her out. Unable to secure employment without connections, Angélique desperately makes her way to Paris, where she rescues a young woman fleeing an abusive madam. With her upper-class breeding, her impeccable style and her father's bequest, Angélique creates Le Boudoir, soon a sensational establishment where powerful men, secret desires and beautiful women come together.

Romy and Thea, two beautiful baby girls, their futures sealed with the flip of a coin. One will enter a life of privilege, surrounded by only the best money can buy. The other will fight for survival in an orphanage, against an evil regime that seeks only to exploit her. Throughout the years their paths will cross, neither knowing who the other one is, their lives overflowing with secrets, blackmail and murder.

1759, Jamie Kinross has started a new life in India as a gem trader, but when his mentor's family is kidnapped he vows to save them. There he encounters Zarmina Miller. She is rich and beautiful, but when it becomes clear that Zarmina's step-son is involved in the plot, he begins to see another side to her - a dark past and a heart just waiting to be thawed. But is it too late?