Historical War Saga

1946: The war might be over but for the Gilby family there are still battles to be fought at home. For Birmingham and the Gilby family the war years have been a time of great change. With husband, Len, having left her for another woman, Ann Gilby is finally free to follow her heart. While the neighbours may be scandalised by having a divorcee in their midst, Ann is determined to rise above the local gossip and make a happy home with her former sweetheart, the father of Ann's youngest child.

Über die Kostbarkeit der Bücher. Dichter Nebel wogt durch die Gassen der Bücherstadt Leipzig, 1933, als das Böse die Macht ergreift. Hier entspinnt sich die tragische Liebe des Buchbinders Jakob Steinfeld zu einer rätselhaften jungen Frau. Juli hat ein Buch geschrieben, das sie einzig ihm anvertrauen will. Doch bald darauf verschwindet sie spurlos. Fast vierzig Jahre später ist auch Jakobs Sohn Robert den Büchern verfallen.

Summer 1935. Best friends Kate Shelton, Ella Tetley and Daphne St. Maur are on the cusp of a new life, having graduated with classics degrees. Kate is desperate to start work on an archaeological dig straightaway, and she is thrilled to be given a position at the famous Knossos palace site in Crete. However, she doesn't bargain for working with gruff site director Lewis Sinclair - nor for her own complex feelings towards him. In Yorkshire, Ella's family expect her to marry Sam, her steady friend who is training to be a doctor....

Berlin, 1939. „Ich liebe dich mehr, als du ahnst. Aber du bist nicht sicher mit mir. Wenn wir nicht verheiratet wären, müsstest du nicht so leiden, terrorisiert von dem gelben Stern auf meiner Brust. Ich könnte niemals wieder glücklich sein, wenn dir meinetwegen etwas zustieße.“ Edith Falkenstein führte einst ein Leben wie aus einem Märchenbuch. Als sie sich in Julius verliebte, öffnete er ihr eine Welt voller Glanz und Pracht. Sie schmückte sich mit den feinsten Juwelen und veranstaltete legendäre Feiern in ihrem prächtigen Herrenhaus.

1915. While World War One changes the country, with food becoming scarce and Britain's young men being called up, it is harder than ever to keep the grand Beach Hotel in Littlehampton running smoothly. Waitress Lili Probert has seen her hard work rewarded at the Beach Hotel, but hides heartbreak behind her sunny personality. Her sweetheart, Norman, is missing in action and has been presumed dead, but she cannot give up hope that he may be found. But when she meets injured soldier Rhodri, a fellow Welshman now living near Littlehampton, she fights hard to ignore her growing attraction for him.

Blackpool, 1922. Martha and Trisha may have escaped poverty, but their fortunes have yet to turn. Happy on her wedding day, Trisha's new fairy-tale romance soon darkens as her husband, Walter, keeps her at arms length. Between his secrecy, and her mother-in-law's coldness, Trisha feels a stranger in her own home, and lonelier than ever. Meanwhile a spectre from Martha's past threatens the happiness she has found with Joshua and Bonnie. When she is called to help in her past love's hour of need, she must decide whether to risk exposing a secret that could cost her the trust of her daughter.

1916. East London. When sixteen-year-old Clover Cooper's mother, Iris, calls her home from work one day, the last thing Clover expects is to find that her mother has given birth to another baby. After all, Clover's unpleasant father, Sidney, has been in France for longer than nine months. Banned from questions, and bound to secrecy by her beloved mother, Clover leaves her infant brother at a nunnery for safekeeping, despite her heartbreak at parting with him. But when Sidney unexpectedly returns from the Western Front, life at home suddenly feels more dangerous than a battlefield.

When orphan Julie Miller is sent to Canada to keep her safe from Hitler’s bombs at the start of WWII, she hopes this will the start of a happier new life for her after years of sadness. Taken in by a schoolteacher, it seems that Julie’s dreams are coming true. But that’s before a shadow is cast over her safe refuge, and before long, she is forced to run away. This is just the start of a long journey, one with many hardships before she can find a place to call home.

Ukraine, 1941. War has ripped Katya’s country and heart in two. When two soldiers knock down her door and force her into a truck, she knows deep down that this might be the last time she ever sees home. As she is driven away to a labor camp, she looks out the tiny window at the barren winter landscape and thinks only of her son, Alexander, who she was forced to leave behind and may never see again.

Eliza Jones and her husband Bryn had a whirlwind romance and married shortly after meeting, but he was soon sent off to fight. In the midst of a Blitz attack on Liverpool, which leaves Eliza with amnesia, she gives birth to their baby son, Alfie. Still struggling with the aftermath of the birth, Eliza is distraught when Alfie is kidnapped from the nursery. As the search for Alfie progresses and the community bands together around Eliza, she is left with more questions than answers. Who would take her baby, and why? A

As 1954 draws to an end, the village of Hen Carw Parc is changing. The post-war boom brings a creeping lethargy as the villagers stay in watching their new TV sets, instead of going out to enjoy each other's company. As usual, however, Nelly is busy keeping tabs on the villagers' comings and goings. There's Griff, whose thieving and dishonesty have long-lasting repercussions; Sheila, whose pregnancy sets tongues wagging; and George, whose helpfulness masks a deeper problem.

As war looms in Europe, 18-year-old Jane Shaw runs the household as an unpaid servant on a meagre budget. When tragedy strikes and she loses her beloved younger brother in suspicious circumstances, Jane takes a position in service looking after Ned, a troubled young boy. Here she meets dashing David Heron, Ned's Uncle and they form an immediate attachment until she is dismissed after being accused of stealing a piece of jewellery. Returning home, Jane and her sister, Melia, are soon orphaned and left at the mercy of their Aunt Alice.

October 1940. Twenty-three-year-old Bobby Bancroft is working as a typist for a city newspaper, but she longs to be breaking the news herself. When she successfully applies for a junior reporter role at The Tyke, a magazine serving the Yorkshire Dales, she's thrilled – even if she only gets the position because so many men are away fighting. Bobby moves to the sleepy village of Silverdale, but she quickly discovers life in the countryside is a different world.

Scouted for her incredible language skills and recruited to work undercover for the French Resistance in occupied France, Claire must learn to evade the enemy and help her allies in secret. Amidst the danger and hiding from the Gestapo, Claire falls in love with striking French-Canadian captain Alain Mitchell. But no one can know about their feelings for each other, and everything is at stake.

June 1914. Edie Moore is a Governess for Lord and Lady Moreland, living comfortably at the grand Downland House in Sussex. But, wanting more from life, she flees to Littlehampton, where she spent many idyllic childhood holidays. Desperate for work, Edie begins working as a chambermaid at the prestigious Beach Hotel, despite the menial tasks being a far cry from her previous job. But as she navigates her new life, friendships, and rivalries, she also grows closer to charming, cheerful porter, Charlie Cobbett, and finally finds the happiness she has been searching for.

Elegant, opulent, authentisch: Der erste Teil von Katja Maybachs großer historischer Familiengeschichte spielt in einem mondänen Kurort am Vorabend des 1. Weltkriegs. Leicht und sommerlich-träge ziehen 1914 die Tage in einem eleganten Kurort nahe der deutsch-französischen Grenze vorüber: Selbst am Vorabend des 1. Weltkriegs will niemand so recht wahrhaben, was sich in Europa zusammenbraut - auch nicht die Geschwister Franz, Luise und Victoria Laverne, die einmal das mondäne Grandhotel Deutscher Kaiser erben werden.

December 1941: Evacuated from the threat of German bombs, sisters Amelie and Mireille have grown up under the storm clouds of war. Now they have joined the fight against Hitler, with Amelie training as a nurse to save wounded soldiers, and Mireille enlisted to help the Air Force wage war in the skies over Europe. But as each sister fights for peace, they are still haunted by the memory of their missing sister who was snatched away from them at the beginning of the war.

1914, kurz vor Beginn des ersten Weltkrieges: Schon als Mädchen schwärmt die unscheinbare Winzertochter Magdalena für den angehenden Ingenieur Matthias. Aber ihre Zuneigung bleibt unerwidert. Noch bevor er in den Krieg eingezogen wird, feiert er mit einer eleganten Frau aus der Stadt Verlobung. Als Magdalena von ihren Brüdern erfährt, dass Matthias nur selten Feldpost von seiner Verlobten erhält, schreibt sie ihm unverhofft – und ein reger Briefwechsel entsteht, der sie durch die schweren Kriegsjahre begleitet.

East London, 1940. At the outbreak of war, hopeless romantic Prue Carmichael and her sister must leave their rural parish behind when their father is posted to a church in Stepney. To Prue, the blitz-ravaged streets of London seem an unlikely place for love to bloom – until a chance encounter throws rakish engineer Jack Quinn into her path. But as their connection deepens, his troubled past begins to emerge, and Prue realises Jack has secrets to hide.

London, 1944. With bombs raining over London, keeping the Battersea Tavern open is no easy feat for owner Winnie Berry - but the community need the warmth and familiarity of the pub more than ever. After marriage, Maureen Fanning had moved out to Wandsworth with her bad-tempered husband Brancher. But when he loses both his job and their lodgings, the only people who will take them in are her kindly grandparents, Len and Renee. Getting a cleaning job at the Battersea Tavern is the least she can do to pay them back. It would all be fine...if it weren't for Brancher.