Historical Family Saga

Maria and Josef live with their children in a valley in westernmost Austria. When the First World War breaks out and Josef is drafted into the army, Maria is left to provide for her family alone. Every day is a struggle against starvation, the harsh alpine climate and the hostile nearby villagers who see Maria as little more than a beautiful temptress out for the men left behind. But when a red-haired stranger arrives in the village, Maria feels happiness seep back into her life and she faces a choice whose consequences will affect the lives of her family for generations to come.

In 1820, Salem Street is sparkling and new: eight small terraced houses built by a Lancashire mill owner for his best workers. Annie Gibson's family is one of the first to move in - a step up in the world for them. But when her mother dies, Annie's happy childhood ends and she is left to bring up her brother and sister. Red-haired, intelligent and startlingly pretty, Annie soon finds herself banished from home by a jealous stepmother. She finds work in the local doctor's household, where she learns about the fascinating world outside Salem Street.

Emmy Dickens lives with her widowed mother in a neat house in neglected Nightingale Court, but Mrs Dickens has always impressed upon her daughter that her main aim in life must be to escape from the court. Emmy sees that marriage is her best way out, and when Peter Wesley, First Officer aboard a cruise ship, asks her to marry him, she is over the moon. Life goes well for the newlyweds; they set up home and start a family. But when Peter is killed and Emmy is left almost penniless, her problems begin....

On a bright June day in 1965, a dozen girls - classmates at a Blue Ridge women's college - launch a ramshackle raft on a trip down the Mississippi. Their journey, inspired by Huckleberry Finn, is duly reported in the Paducah, Kentucky newspaper. 35 years later, four of the "girls" reunite to cruise the river again. This time, it's on the luxury steamboat The Belle of Natchez. This time, when they reach New Orleans, they'll give the River the ashes of a fifth rafter: Margaret ("Baby") Ballou.

Two months after the suspicious and much-publicized death of his father on the island of Martha's Vineyard, it is taking all of Adam Blaine's will to suture the deep wounds the tragedy has inflicted upon his family and himself. As the court inquest into Benjamin Blaine's death casts suspicions on those closest to him, Adam struggles to protect them from those who still suspect that his father was murdered by one of his kin.

They loved. They lost. They lived. In the small Yorkshire town of Cottenly - dominated by the steel works and surrounded by beautiful countryside - Isaac Stanford lives with his wife Emily and their three lovely daughters, known locally as the Stanford lasses. Alice, the eldest, lives only for her work as a secretary and chapel on Sunday.

Die Fortsetzung von "Stay away from Gretchen". Tom Monderath ist frisch verliebt, und glücklich. Bis er durch Zufall auf seinen Halbbruder Henk stößt, der alles über ihren gemeinsamen Vater wissen will. Doch Konrad starb vor vielen Jahren, und seine demente Mutter Greta kann Tom nicht befragen. Als sich weitere Halbgeschwister melden, wird es Tom zu viel. Toms Freundin Jenny und Henk hingegen folgen den Spuren Konrads. Selbst fast noch ein Kind kämpfte Konrad im Krieg, geriet in amerikanische Gefangenschaft, bevor er in den späten 1940er-Jahren nach Heidelberg kommt.

Liverpool, 1940. When her childhood sweetheart, Johnny, is killed in action, Maxine Grey loses more than her husband - she loses her best friend. Desperate to make a difference in this awful war, Maxine takes a nursing job at London’s St Thomas’ hospital. She takes comfort in the attentions of a handsome surgeon, but Edwin Blake isn’t all he seems. And as the Blitz descends on the capital, Maxine faces more heartache. When she returns to Liverpool, she harbours a secret.

On the eve of the Battle of Waterloo, two families meet at the Duchess of Richmond's Ball. From this moment on, their stories will be linked by a secret. Julian Fellowes's Belgravia is a story in 11 episodes published week by week in the tradition of Charles Dickens. Belgravia is the story of a secret. A secret that unravels behind the porticoed doors of London's grandest postcode. The story behind the secret will be revealed in weekly bite-sized instalments complete with twists and turns and cliff-hanger endings.

Falling in love with her handsome and enigmatic neighbor is out of the question. As always, Mary will do her duty and ignore her heart. Then into their lives steps a ghost from Mary's past, whose outrageous behavior has Mary questioning her worldview and Christopher acting upon his feelings, and for all to see. The mismatched couple begin to wonder if in fact love can prevail - that a happily ever after might just be possible if only they dare to follow their hearts.

Since following her heart and moving from her comfortable home in Scotland to the harsh mountainside of Ardtur, County Donegal, Hannah McGinley hasn’t had the easiest life. But surrounded by her two children and her loving husband Patrick she has found happiness. When her daughter returns home with news that her school may close as one of the teachers is moving away, Hannah feels compelled to take the vacant post. With the schoolmaster Daniel having lost his sight, Hannah knows that he won’t be able to manage the children alone.

Sometimes a family's deepest silences hide the most important secrets. For Mina, a London-based travel writer, the enigmatic silence surrounding her aunt Carmela has become a personal obsession. Carmela disappeared from her Italian hometown long ago and is mentioned only in fragments and whispers. Mina has resisted prying, respectful of her family's Sardinian reserve. But now, with her mother battling cancer, it's time to learn the truth.

In the late 1800s, the residents of a small village in coastal Italy migrated to the promised land of America. They eventually settled in Roseto, Pennsylvania, where they re-created every detail of their former lives, including the centerpiece of Roseto’s colorful old-world tradition: the annual pageant for Our Lady of Mount Caramel—or “the Big Time,” as it’s called by the young women competing to be its Queen.

Annie Pearson is working on Emmerdale Farm, while her love, Edward Sugden is at the front line. Lily Dingle has found purpose in joining the ATS, though she may get more than she bargained for. And Meg Warcup, now teaching at the local school, has taken in two children evacuated from Hull. They have adjusted to their new way of life until one day a German plane comes crashing down in the village....and changes everything in the village of Beckindale.

"They’re running wild. Feral! If I had a shilling for every time a Scott Street boy said he was doing something when he was doing something else entirely I’d be living in Cardiff in a house made of Lardy cake. What did I say? Bad things will happen!" The idea of the war coming to their small, impoverished Welsh mining village always seemed remote, but with one explosive event and the arrival of the Americans preparing for the invasion of France, the people of Treherbert find their world turned upside down.

A successful horse breeder and self-proclaimed rake, Harry Lester samples women like wines. But after having his heart trampled upon by someone he actually loved, he has no intention of falling for a woman again, let alone be ensnared by the trap of marriage. Now, with a large inheritance to his name, Harry knows that he'd best start running from London's matchmaking mothers and widows.

In the summer of 1986 in a small Chinese village, 10-year-old Junie receives a momentous letter from her parents, who had left for America years ago: Her father promises to return home and collect her by her 12th birthday. But Junie’s growing determination to stay put in the idyllic countryside with her beloved grandparents threatens to derail her family’s shared future.

Inspired by the true story of the Quality Street factory and its loyal workers, this is a nostalgic and compelling novel and the perfect Christmas treat. At 16 years old, Irene ‘Reenie’ Calder is leaving school with little in the way of qualifications. She is delighted to land a seasonal job at Mackintosh’s Quality Street factory. Reenie feels like a kid let loose in a sweet shop, but trouble seems to follow her around, and it isn’t long before she falls foul of the strict rules.

One hundred fifty years of Roses' Tolivers, Warwicks, and DuMonts! We begin in the antebellum South on Plantation Alley in South Carolina, where Silas Toliver, deprived of his inheritance, joins up with his best friend Jeremy Warwick to plan a wagon train expedition to the "black waxy" promise of a new territory called Texas. Slavery, westward expansion, abolition, the Civil War, love, marriage, friendship, tragedy and triumph-all the ingredients (and much more) that made so many love Roses so much-are here in abundance.

The East End of London has been devastated by the Blitz and the people are struggling to come to terms with their ravaged city. Rationing bites ever deeper, and and everything that makes life better is in short supply. For the district nurses, the challenges are tougher than ever. Gladys loves her work in the Civil Nursing Reserve, but just when she needs to rely on her sister at home to help out with the chores, she turns into a handful of trouble. Edith is learning to cope with her boyfriend's injuries after Dunkirk but will she have to choose between her love for him and her career?