Showing results by narrator "Janine Birkett" in All Categories

Ivy, Dulcie, Barbara, Ann, Dorothy and Jean all had different reasons for applying to work at Carr’s biscuits, but once they had put on their overalls and walked through the factory gates they discovered a community full of life, laughter and friendship. To those who didn’t know, the biscuit factory that towered over Carlisle might look like just another slice of the industrial North, a noisy and chaotic place with workers trooping in and out at all hours.

Eighteen-year-old Evie arrives at Post Stone Farm in December 1944, and, choosing to join the land army, she longs for quiet days. The other land girls have already formed close friendships, and Evie barely makes a ripple when trying to blend in. But it is there she falls in love with Giorgio, an Italian POW. All this changes one June evening when Corporal Norman Clark arrives at the farm, and a startling revelation thrusts Evie into the spotlight.

Gwenda and Douglas Brady were among the millions of British children sent to live with new families for their own safety during the Second World War, leaving behind their parents, their friends and all that felt familiar and safe. Evacuation could be a scary experience, but five-year-old Gwenda and her brother were lucky enough to be housed with a kindly schoolmaster and his wife, and soon the realities of the war felt very far away.

The Davies family is as dysfunctional as they come. When Frank marries a younger woman, Susan, his 10-year-old daughter, Louise, feels pushed out, and even more so when baby Karen arrives. Now, years later, with her father gone, Louise feels even more the odd one out. Obsessed with finding her birth mother, she distances herself from her family and spitefully makes trouble for Karen whenever the opportunity arises.

When Britain declares war on Germany in 1939, Carolyn Maddison is still a schoolgirl. Her elder brother, Alastair, wastes no time in joining the RAF as a flying officer, and Carolyn decides that when she is 18 she will follow him into the service by joining the Women's Auxiliary Air Force. While reporting to the Air Ministry in London, she meets a good-looking, charismatic pilot, Charlie Wade, currently employed in propaganda work.

In the heart of Ashington - a bustling Geordie mining town - a handsome red-brick vicarage, surrounded by rambling gardens, stands proudly among the rows of terraced houses. It is the perfect place for playing games, keeping secrets and chasing the ghosts of previous occupants, and it will be nine-year-old Barbara's new home now that her father is to be vicar in this strange new place.

Nineteen-year-old Panda is planning to meet her suicide buddy, Marty, at midnight. Until then, she wants to experience Last Summer Night in Kirkwall, when, according to local legend, all those who should never be allowed out, come out. She encounters some interesting people: Sigurd and his feuding Viking family; her tattooed friend Martin, who is actually a girl and a criminal, of sorts; Noah, a visiting reporter and sometime relationship counsellor; Davey, an itinerant and talkative 84-year-old; and her father’s new girlfriend, Sandy.

Following a scandalous affair, wayward Emma Devaney is sent in disgrace from her home in Ireland to Ryhope, where she will live with her widowed aunt, Bessie Brogan, and help run her pub. Bessie is kind but firm, and at first, Emma rebels against her lack of freedom. Struggling to fit in, she turns to the wrong person for comfort, and becomes pregnant. Accepting she must embrace her new life for the sake of her baby, Emma pours her energy into making the pub thrive and he catches the attention of Robert, a gruff but sincere farmer, who means to win her heart.