Showing results by narrator "Heather Long" in All Categories

From the day they first meet as teenagers, Fern and Jessica are best friends. Despite their differences, they are there for each other throughout everything, navigating the difficulties of growing up and fitting in. That is until Jessica crosses a line that Fern can't forgive. But now, more than 10 years later, Jessica has unexpectedly reappeared in Fern's life.

The fastest milk-bottle-delivery girl in East Yorkshire, Evie is tall as a tree and hot as the desert sand. She dreams of an independent life lived under the bright lights of London (or Leeds). The two posters of Adam Faith on her bedroom wall (‘brooding Adam’ and ‘sophisticated Adam’) offer wise counsel about a future beyond rural East Yorkshire. Her role models are Charlotte Bronte, Shirley MacLaine and the queen. But, before she can decide on a career, she must first deal with the malign presence of her future stepmother, the manipulative and money-grubbing Debbie.

Jessie has never known her real dad, and when her mum dies she thinks any hope of finding him is gone. As she goes goes off the rails, her stepdad announces that her father is Johnny Jefferson - legendary rock star and former hell-raiser. Still dealing with her loss, and now the daughter of a superstar, Jessie is sucked into the LA lifestyle - paparazzi, parties and hot guitar-wielding boys included. But is Johnny up to the job? And, more importantly, is Jessie?

There’s nothing to trace Anna back to her old life. Nothing to link her to the ‘incident’. At least that’s what she thinks...until the whispers start up again. As time begins to run out on her secrets, Anna finds herself irresistibly drawn to the tale of Maggie, a local girl accused of witchcraft centuries earlier. A girl whose story has terrifying parallels to Anna’s own.... The compelling YA debut from Laura Bates, founder of the Everyday Sexism Project and best-selling author of Girl Up.

A young woman's future is torn away in a heartbeat. Herded on to a train bound for Auschwitz, in an act of desperation she entrusts her most precious possession to a stranger. All she has left now is hope. Jean-Luc thought he had left it all behind. The scar on his face a small price to pay for surviving the horrors of Nazi Occupation. Now, he has a new life in California, a family. He never expected the past to come knocking on his door. On a darkened platform, two destinies become entangled. Their choice will change the future in ways neither could have imagined.

Jessie Jefferson is back in the next instalment from best-selling author Paige Toon. Perfect for fans of Geek Girl, Jessica Cole and Girl Online. Life as the undercover daughter of a rock god isn't going to be easy. How will Jessie adjust to her old boring life again after spending her summer living it up with her dad in LA? With tough decisions ahead (and not just choosing between two hot boys), can she cope juggling her two very different lives? Summer may be over, but Jessie's story is just beginning....

Is the life of a famous rock star's daughter all it's cracked up to be? And what about dating your fellow band member just as you hit the big time? Jessie is still getting used to being a celebrity and the daughter of one of the world’s biggest rock stars. With her own music career on the rise, a gorgeous love interest and a fun group of friends, it seems Jessie’s glamorous LA life couldn’t get any better...but things are about to get really complicated.

A missing girl returns unharmed, and a family torn apart by tragedy begins to heal. But strange things start to happen to the Wick family. The media are tipped off, throwing them into a spotlight they cannot hide from. DNA results go missing. Holes begin to appear in the girl’s story. Is the mysterious girl Abigail Wick? Who is the stranger on the boat who took Abigail? What happened 14 years ago? Only one person knows the truth.

In Vaxxers, we hear directly from Professor Gilbert and her colleague, Dr Catherine Green, as they reveal the inside story of making the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine and the cutting-edge science and sheer hard work behind it. This is their story of fighting a pandemic as ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances. Sarah and Cath share the heart-stopping moments in the eye of the storm, they separate fact from fiction, they explain how they made a safe vaccine in record time with the eyes of the world watching and they give us hope for the future.

1941. Whilst London is battered by air raids, Felicity 'Fliss' Carmichael has troubles of her own. Still reeling from catching her fiance cheating, she flees to her childhood home at St. Winifred's Rectory, reuniting with her sister Prue and Hester Katz, a Jewish doctor sheltering there. Though heartbroken, Fliss finds purpose again as a journalist. On assignment, she crosses paths with Detective Inspector Timothy Wallace, who shares her passion for truth and justice – though not her political beliefs. Despite their differences, an instant spark ignites between them.

1972. Ten years on from the events of The Miseducation of Evie Epworth and Evie is settled in London working for the BBC. She has everything she's ever dreamed of (a career, a leatherette briefcase, an Ossie Clark poncho) but, following an unfortunate incident involving Princess Anne and a Hornsea Pottery mug, she finds herself having to rethink her life and piece together work, love, grief and multiple pairs of cork-soled platform sandals.

Becky Brown has selected extracts from the Mass Observation Archives to anthologise the voices of everyday people as they deal individually and collectively with the crisis of the Second World War. The diarists themselves have been selected from every level of society - from warehousemen to widows, soldiers to farmhands, WRENs to architects. The extracts have been chosen to both uplift and to ground, to remind listeners that nothing is new, that everything can be weathered and perhaps even made better. After all, World War II saw the birth of the NHS.

We call it the Great Escape. The annual trip where my boss asks us expert travel guides to escort a group of privileged, uber-wealthy clientele on some far-flung expedition, a cut-throat contest for riches and glory. The stakes have never been higher, nor the challenge harder: I must summit Mount Kilimanjaro before my rival guide to win the ultimate prize. But this once-in-a-lifetime trip was never about winning to me. I'm here for answers, even if no one is ready to give them up. By the time we reach the top I will have the truth, if it kills me.

All Freya has ever wanted to do is paint. So when she fails her Master’s Degree in Art, on the same day that her boyfriend decides he needs a ‘more serious’ partner, to Freya it feels like the end of the world. Luckily, she has a saviour in the shape of best friend Lola, who invites her to the sleepy Cornish village of Polcarrow, to work in her café. With nothing keeping her in London, Freya jumps at the chance of a summer by the sea. Freya needs time to focus on herself. But then dark and mysterious biker Angelo blows into town on a stormy afternoon.

Kate, Daniel and Luke met at university. Unlikely best friends, Daniel and Luke's bond has nevertheless stood the test of time, through marriages, children and tragedies. But midlife has crept up on them, and hidden truths are beginning to surface. Kate feels alone in her marriage and begins to seek answers elsewhere. Luke's recklessness and hedonism are spiralling out of control, putting pressure on the family life he hoped would save him. And Daniel has discovered a secret that threatens to overturn everything.

When Jessica, a young British woman, discovers a shocking secret about her birth, she travels to Switzerland in search of answers. She knows her mother spent time in the country writing an article on the Swiss women’s rights movement, but what she doesn’t know is what happened to her while she was there. Can Jess summon the courage to face the truth about her family, or will her search only hurt herself and those around her even more?

Get ready to enter a world of hidden treasure, magic spells and enchanting tales, all by the world's greatest children's author, Enid Blyton. From wicked witches stealing magical items from the queen, to missing keys to Fairyland, there's magic everywhere in this collection of short stories.

The day Scarlett dies should have been one of the most important of her life. It doesn't feel fair that she'll never have the chance to fulfil her dreams. And now, she's still ... here ... somehow, watching the ripple effect of her death on the lives of those she loved the most. Evie cannot contemplate her life without Scarlett, and she certainly cannot forgive Nate, the man she blames for her best friend's death. But Nate keeps popping up when she least expects him to, catapulting Evie's life in directions she'd never let herself imagine possible.

In the aftermath of Jo Cox's tragic death in 2016, her husband, Brendan Cox, urged us to remember Jo's life and what she stood for and not the manner of her death. In this moving and impassioned portrait of Jo - as daughter, mother, wife, sister, MP and activist - we see how much she gave and how much more she had to give, and her legacy of values and beliefs which will live on.

London E17, 2019, a yellow kitchen stands as a metaphor for the lifelong friendship between three women: Claude, the earnest baker, fragile and goal-orientated Sophie and stubborn and political Giulia. They have the best kind of friendship, chasing life and careers; dating, dreaming and consuming but always returning to be reunited in the yellow kitchen. That is, until a trip to Lisbon unravels unexplored desires and the friendship between Claude and Sophie becomes intimate. Having sex is one thing, waking up the day after is the beginning of something new.