Historical Romance Families

Alice Pendelbury believes everything in her life is pretty much in order - from her good friends to her burgeoning career. But even Alice has to admit it’s been an odd week. Not only has her belligerent neighbor, Mr. Daldry, suddenly become a surprisingly agreeable confidant, but he’s encouraging her to take seriously the fortune-teller who told her that only by traveling to Turkey can Alice meet the most important person in her life. What’s more, the peculiarly insistent Mr. Daldry has even agreed to finance Alice’s trip - one that against all reason seems to be predestined.

1939: Nerys Watkins leaves rural Wales to accompany her husband on a missionary posting to India. Travelling from lonely Ladakh, high in the Himalayas, Nerys discovers a new world in the city of Srinagar. Here, in the exquisite heart of Kashmir, the British live on carved wooden houseboats and dance, flirt and gossip as if there is no war. But the battles draw ever closer.

When a mysterious gentleman arrives on his doorstep, Alexander Moreland is astonished to discover that the stranger is not a gentleman at all but a beautiful young woman disguised as a man and in great need of assistance. The woman remembers nothing except her own name, Sabrina, and has only the contents of her pockets as clues to her identity. Sabrina is certain that she is on the run from someone or something - how else to explain the bruises on her face and the pervasive sense of dread she feels?

The year is 1794, and Fritz - passionate, idealistic and brilliant - is seeking his father's permission to announce his engagement to his heart's desire: 12-year-old Sophie. His astounded family and friends are amused and disturbed by his betrothal. What can he be thinking? Tracing the dramatic early years of the young German who was to become the great romantic poet and philosopher Novalis, The Blue Flower is a masterpiece of invention, evoking the past with a reality that we can almost feel.

1924. Ginger Kelly wakes up in tranquil Cocoa Beach, Florida, having fled south to safety in the company of disgraced Prohibition agent Oliver Anson Marshall and her newly-orphaned young sister, Patsy. But paradise is short-lived. Marshall is reinstated to the agency with suspicious haste and put to work patrolling for rumrunners on the high seas, from which he promptly disappears. Gin hurries north to rescue him, only to be trapped in an agonizing moral quandary by Marshall’s desperate mother.

For years, Isobel Latimer has composed serious novels for serious people, but to dwindling acclaim and ever-more dwindling gain. Now her husband is ill and she must carry their financial burden alone, and in secret. But if the public don’t want careful moral fables any longer, why not provide an outrageous tale of sex and satanism, and an author to match? The incomparable, uncontrollable Zelda de Vere is born.

Cecilia Cosgrove’s beauty opens doors and hearts everywhere she goes. With a marquess courting her, the status and wealth her family is counting on her to obtain is finally within her reach—until she meets a French nobleman who immediately pegs her as affected and superficial. Poor émigré Jacques Levesque has been disguised as a French nobleman for almost as long as he can remember, trying his hardest to keep his head down in a society obsessed with rank and high birth. But when Cecilia Cosgrove comes into his life, he finds it hard to maintain his façade—or to want to.

At the advanced age of 26, the independent, wealthy and imminently practical Isabella Latham has no expectation of marriage. But, good-hearted and dutiful, Isabella accompanies her two young country cousins to oversee their London debut...only to find that it's she who is attracting suitors...all of whom do seem to have quite an excess of creditors!

In 1858 Annie Hallam has at last found complete happiness. She has three healthy babies and adores her husband, Frederick. After years of struggling to make a living in the small Lancashire town of Bilsden, Annie knows she deserves to sit back and enjoy her life - after all, she's not yet 40, and still in her prime.

For childhood friends Leo Kelly, Jane Devlin, and newly ordained "Packy" Keenan, the summers they spent at the lake together were times of pure magic. And no summer was more enchanting than the summer of 1948 - until a tragic car wreck killed two of their friends.

A beautiful, very moving, melancholic and elegiac novel set in the late 1960s in Melton, a small town in the West Country. The story revolves around a disparate group of people who come together there to establish an arts festival...This is the story of their intertwining relationships and how they come to love, and not to love each other in different ways and why - a perfect book to curl up and read by the fireside on an autumn afternoon and as satisfying a read as Brief Encounter is a film.

Nathan Raveneau, son of Andre & Devon (Silver Storm), is known as "The Scapegrace" in Regency London for his rakish exploits and devastating good looks. He is also a sea captain with an estate on Barbados. To gain land near his enemy, Xavier Crowe, Raveneau agrees to act as protector to headstrong Adrienne Beauvisage - and keep her chaste until her 21st birthday.

Adrienne is both outraged and intrigued by the man who calls himself Nathan Essex.

For three years, Lady Veronica Smithson has been perfectly happy as a widow. Still, the right gentleman could provide the benefits of marriage without the tedious restrictions. And in Sir Sebastian Hadley-Attwater, renowned explorer and rogue, Veronica is sure she has found him. Sebastian will come into his inheritance in a matter of weeks - if his family deems him responsible enough. There’s no better way to prove his maturity than with a home and a wife. Veronica will share his bed, but she steadfastly refuses to marry....

Dashing French pirate Jean-Philippe Beauvisage revels in a life of complete freedom...until the night at a ball in Georgian London, when a Russian beauty quietly steals his heart. Heartbroken Antonia Varyshkova, who has lost her parents and her home in a St. Petersburg fire, stops in London en route to a new life with her brother in America. When her arrogant ship's captain, Tobias Ormond, insists that she attend a ball with him, Antonia reluctantly agrees.

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.

Lady Amanda Locke has struck out miserably in her two Seasons on the marriage mart. Beautiful, titled, and charming - even if she does talk a bit too much - Amanda doesn’t understand why love eludes her. Even her father, the Duke of Norford, is so perplexed he is prepared to take drastic measures to ensure his daughter’s happiness. Now, as Amanda begins her third Season, she gets a little help from Cupid, whose knowledge of basic animal attraction has guided him in arranging more than a few successful matches.

Montana Territory, 1887.

Luke McCutcheon and his twelve-year-old son set out to attend a family friend's wedding, hoping for some rest and relaxation. After arriving in the tiny mountain....

Ruth has returned to Edinburgh after many years of exile, left rootless by the end of her marriage and career and now the death of her father, from whom she had long been estranged. She is faced with the daunting task of clearing his house, believing he had removed all traces of her mother. Yet hidden away in a barely used top-floor room, she finds he had secretly kept a cupboard full of her possessions. Sifting through the ancient papers, Ruth discovers the diary and letters written by her ancestor from the 18th century, Thomas Erskine.

Evelyn Hadley-Attwater has it all - a genteel Victorian life replete with loving husband, ball gowns and elegant parties. No one, including the man she married, suspects that she was once “Eve,” a spy for England’s most enigmatic intelligence agency. Summoned for one final assignment, the excitement of her former life and memories of her mysterious, flirtatious boss “Sir” prove too tempting.... Adrian Hadley-Attwater is a respectable, dignified gentleman. But even the most proper gentlemen have secrets of their own. Secrets from the rest of the world, from their families, from their wives.

The Duke of Greystoke’s Christmas Revelry is famous throughout the British Isles for its plays, dancing, magical grotto...not to mention scandals leading to the marriage licenses he hands out like confetti. But not everyone welcomes a visit from Cupid.