Historical Fiction Girl

London, 1944/45. Kate Henderson is an energetic and spirited young woman. As a trained paramedic and ambulance driver she does her work courageously and with determination, even though underneath she is still wrestling with grief after witnessing the shooting death of her diplomat father seven years earlier. Her father’s murder was never properly investigated and it remains unsolved. Kate’s life is interrupted once more when she wakes up one night to the sound of the air raid alarm and the terror whistles of a bomb’s stabilizers screaming toward the roof of her house.

Liverpool, 1939. Bella Rogers thought her life was just starting; she can’t wait to get married to her childhood sweetheart, Bobby. But when war is declared and Bobby is called up, his letters stop, leaving Bella heartbroken and alone. Then her family is torn apart by tragedy when her angelic 5-year-old sister dies from a terrible illness. They can barely afford a funeral, but the church is packed with the entire community, devastated for their loss. Grieving for her sister and lost love, Bella finds a job at the Bryant and May factory, making matches.

1876, Victorian London. Minnie Ward, the feisty scriptwriter for the Variety Palace Music Hall, is devastated when her best friend is found brutally murdered. She enlists the help of private detective Albert Easterbrook to help her find justice, even though he already has his hands full trying to catch the notorious Hairpin Killer. Together they navigate London, from its high-class clubs to its murky underbelly. But as the bodies pile up, Albert's burgeoning feelings for his amateur partner start to interfere.

When Nazis break down the front door of 18-year-old Trudi’s home and seize the Jewish couple hiding in her attic, she’s devastated, and is suddenly solely responsible for their two innocent children. The whispered rumours about the resistance are her only hope. A man called Frans and his cousin Piet risk their lives every day helping scared and abandoned Jewish children escape into the countryside. Under the cover of night, she races to beg for their help.

Fearless Seffy was hoping for a transfer to England to be near Callum, the Canadian soldier she has given her heart to. Instead she is instructed to train a new group of lumberjills. Will their unhelpful attitude finally be a match for Seffy’s determination and cheerfulness? Sensible Jean is a true believer in the wartime effort. When she meets a conscientious objector can she accept that following the rules might not always define a person? And young Missy has come all the way over from Canada to surprise her first love, Callum who is stationed as a soldier in England.

Cecile has been raised to a life of privilege at Polruan House, by her widowed father and aunt. Now she's of age, they are determined that she make a proper match, but Cecile's heart belongs to their coachman, Sam - most definitely not suitable marriage material. When Sam turns to his friend, smuggler Zach Carver, for help eloping with Cecile, Zach tells of a recent encounter with Lise, a beautiful but poor girl in St Ives, who is the mirror image of Cecile.

They call Gabriela "Tree Girl". Gabi climbs trees to be within reach of the eagles and watch the sun rise into an empty sky. She is at home among the outstretched branches of the Guatemalan forests. Then one day from the safety of a tree, Gabi witnesses the sights and sounds of an unspeakable massacre. She vows to be Tree Girl no more and joins the hordes of refugees struggling to reach the Mexican border. She has lost her whole family; her entire village has been wiped out.

Inspired by encounters with the paintings of Ford Madox Brown to create a life beyond her beginnings, Muriel takes on the mantle of family responsibility. It is a duty she resents when she wants to shine, to be in the spotlight, and escape a fate that seems mapped out for her. As a teenager on a street corner in Moss Side, she meets Jim and sees a way to find a love that is lacking in her family and to meld him to her will. She rails against the expectation that she will be a wife and a mother, and is instead happy as a dance instructor and dressmaker, making silk gowns for rich ladies.

An incredible talent, Maya Rodale continues her deliciously exciting “Writing Girls” historical romance series with A Tale of Two Lovers. Fans of the bestselling romance of Laura Lee Guhrke and Suzanne Enoch will adore this Regency Era-set love story from one of the most exciting members of the new generation of romantic fiction writers.

It's 1919 in Ashford-in-the-Water, Derbyshire. The Ryan family are adjusting to life in the aftermath of the First World War. Walter has returned home a broken man, and so it falls to his son, Josh, and daughter, Emily, to do their best to keep their family business as the village candle makers going. Josh and Emily are great friends with Thomas 'Trip' Trippet, whose father owns a cutlery manufacturing company in Sheffield, and Amy Clark, daughter of the local blacksmith.

Berlin, 1989. As the wall between East and West falls, Miriam Winter cares for her dying father, Henryk. When he cries out for someone named Frieda - and Miriam discovers an Auschwitz tattoo hidden under his watch strap - Henryk’s secret history begins to unravel. Searching for more clues of her father’s past, Miriam finds an inmate uniform from the Ravensbrück women’s camp concealed among her mother’s things. Within its seams are dozens of letters to Henryk written by Frieda.

The second book in the Izzy Walsh Mystery series! Springtime is beautiful in the cozy town of Twin Oaks, nestled along the New England coastline. It’s 1954, and Izzy Walsh is at The Mariner’s Whisper, Twin Oaks’ most popular dinner club, for a girls' night out. But the fun is short-lived, and the highballs run dry when the chef is found murdered the next morning. Izzy finds herself drawn into the mystery when clues turn up everywhere she goes. She is determined to help, but a party of suspects begins to crowd the menu, and it becomes hard to choose just one.

Tragedy strikes a small Yorkshire mining town when Sarah Wild’s husband dies in a terrible accident. Widowed and destitute, Sarah is forced to remarry to save her daughters, Mary-Anne and Eliza, from the workhouse. But her new husband is a violent drunk, and when Sarah tragically dies too, Mary-Anne and Eliza are orphaned. Unable to rely on their drunken stepfather, Mary-Anne and Eliza are left to fend for themselves. They are determined to stick together, but life becomes complicated when Mary-Anne, the eldest, falls pregnant with the child of a married mine owner.

When Ned Giles is orphaned as a teenager, he heads West, hoping to leave his troubles behind by joining the 1932 Great Apache Expedition on their search for the young son of a wealthy Mexican landowner who was kidnapped by wild Apaches. But the expedition's goal becomes compromised when they encounter a wild Apache girl in a Mexican jail cell, victim of a Mexican massacre of her tribe that has left her orphaned and unwilling to eat or speak.

Dartmoor, 1914. Grace Dannings is a farmer’s daughter, but she dreams of making her mark as a London Suffragette. Too bad she’s stuck in Walkhampton, the sleepy village where she was born. As a child, she could escape to the wheelwright’s mill. Spellbound, she’d watch labourers hammer iron and timber into wheels. Now she’s a woman and nothing about the village feels like home. The men are brutish, the women afraid of change. Perhaps she could have married Martin, the mill owner’s son. But society says she’s not good enough.

1943. Lidia De Angelis has kept a low profile since Mussolini’s laws wrenched her from her childhood sweetheart. But when the Germans occupy Venice, she must flee the city to save her life. Lidia joins the partisans in the Venetian mountains, where she meets David, an English soldier fighting for the same cause. As she grows closer to him, harsh German reprisals and her own ardent patriotic activities threaten to tear them apart.

Dartmoor, 1875. Rose Maddiford, beautiful, vivacious and intelligent, could have her pick of men across Dartmoor. But she is in no hurry to marry unless it is for true love - and certainly not while she can help her father manage the Cherrybrook Gunpowder Mills. Then tragedy strikes. Rose’s father is injured by an explosion at the mill, and the family is left teetering on the edge of poverty. Rose is left with just two options: accept arrogant, controlling Charles Chadwicks’ proposal and move to London or let her family perish. Rose must choose duty over love.

Bridget Milligan has donned a uniform and joined the nursing services where she becomes intrigued with the miracles of modern medicine. She’s also torn between family loyalty, her new career and Lyndon O’Neill, the love of her life. Is it too impossible to hope that everything will come out right in the end? Phyllis Harvey is still serving in Malta where she sees the casualties of war first hand. Finally it seems like Phyllis is blessed with true in love, but fate can sometimes be a rocky road and nothing is that certain.

Kara, as a ward with no parentage and no future, has been raised knowing nothing outside her lady's chambers. Until Royce Capello, a visiting nobleman, is struck by her ice-pale looks, and demands her as payment for the land the family needs. With barely time to protest, Kara is sold and packed off for a life as a concubine until a raiding party descends on Royce's company and she's kidnapped for the second time in as many days. Whatever happens, Kara will be alone in the world, inexperienced and fearing even the vast unfamiliar sky. But one raider gives her a choice - and a magic mirror appears to show her where each path will lead.

Dartmoor, 1914. Twenty-four-year-old Marianne Warrington is in danger of being left on the shelf. That's what her mother says, and that’s precisely how she wants it. She has her future mapped out, and it doesn’t include marriage or babies. Instead, she vows to devote herself to rearing horses on her parents’ farm. Then World War One breaks out, and the Warringtons’ peaceful existence is shattered forever. Amid the chaos, Marianne seizes her chance to prove she’s more than just a spinster.