Pat Steadman

Joan Park recounts her childhood years growing up in Liverpool from 1927 to 1936. The daughter of a ship steward and a housewife, she captures the atmosphere of ordinary family life in pre-war Britain .

Book 2 of the ‘Joan Park’ series. Sequel to ’86 SMITH STREET’ (8680). In this continuation of her memoirs, Joan takes us back to the early years of the War. The family have moved to a new housing estate on the edge of Liverpool and there are new schools and new friends to cope with.

Agatha Raisin has arrived with friend and rival in the sleuthing business, Toni, to enjoy a celebratory hog roast at Winter Parva. But as the spit pig is carried towards the bed of fiery charcoal Agatha - and the rest of the village - realise that things aren't as they seem.....  Book 22 of series.

When Hitler comes to power in 1933, a tight-knit group of friends and lovers become hunted outlaws overnight. United in their resistance to the madness and tyranny of Nazism, they must flee the country. But England is not the safe-haven they think it to be and a single, chilling act of betrayal will tear them apart...

Flora Chapman is in her fifties when her husband dies in a bizarre accident. She decides to finish his history of Hurcott Ducis, but a reference to Anne of Cleves leads her to do her own research. Meanwhile, in the Louvre, Holbein's portrait of Anne begins to tell the story of how she survived the Tudor marriage.

When Charlie Higgins is unfairly dismissed from his job in a Leicester shoe factory his family become crippled by poverty. Refusing to surrender to her husband's misfortunes, Annie manages to keep food on the table and faith in their hearts. Until tragedy strikes again...

From the moment Jenny accepts a baby-sitting job, she knows she has made a terrible mistake.

Sid has been given a pair of gerbils, Bubble and Squeak, but his mother doesn't want them in the house! The battle to keep them is on.

Summer 1952 and in west bay Tom Arnold is trying to recover from the devastating loss of his wife and children when a car deliberately ploughed into their's. Kathy Wilson fled to the house she inherited there after a showdown with her mother. As the two start to rebuild their lives their happiness is still marred by the jealousy of others. Some explicit sexual content.

A colourful insight into the upstairs-downstairs world of domestic service, in which the author describes her progression from one large house to another to find her unassailable place in the strictly organized below-stairs hierarchy.

Abby, Jess, Lizzie and Erin are happily enjoying their lives. Then a tragedy occurs which affects them all, making them realise just how precious life is.

This is the story of a local pharmacist, Ave Maria Mulligan, who has been keeping the townsfolk's secrets for years. She is about to discover a scandal in her own family's past that will blow the lid right off her quiet, uneventful life.  Book 1 of series.

Mary Marsh has lost her only child, but rather than allow her peace in which to grieve, her mother cajoles her into participating in a proper family Christmas. As the various guests arrive the house descends into farcical chaos.

Monty and Ada are old friends. They worked together on the frontline in Belgium, where Monty was a nurse and Ada drove ambulances. And now, Bleakly Hall has brought them together again. For all the residents and staff at Bleakly, the end of the Great War has brought changes... not all of them good.

Set in Cardiff a child suffers a devastating brain injury. The story traces the journey of his mother into a world where she battles against the odds to heal him. Through her intimate day by day musings, the book explores the impact of the tragedy on the mother's thoughts and feelings as the most extraordinary relationship unfolds.

It was eight years since 13-year-old Patrick Ashby vanished and was thought to have drowned himself. Now it seemed, he had returned - just in time to claim the family inheritance. But if Patrick really had committed suicide, who was this mysterious young man claiming to be him and calling himself Brat Farrar?

Twelve hours after a woman's body is washed up on a deserted shore her traumatized child is discovered twenty miles away. But why was Kate killed yet her daughter allowed to live? X rated, contains offensive language and explicit sex.

An excellent 1932 novel by a very popular pre-war and post-warwriter, chronicling the life of a hard-working and kindly London architectover thirty-five years.

The year is 1880. In West London, a dedicated doctor collapses and dies on the same night that one of his most reliable employees disappears. Frances Doughty, a young sleuth with a reputation for solving knotty cases, is engaged to find the missing man, but nothing is as it seems.

Why do cats soil in the house, fight with next door's cat, behave aggressively towards people or pull out their own fur? This book answers these questions and many more, and will enable all cat owners to reach a far better understanding with their feline companions.

In a small market town in Lincolnshire in the early 1900s, Kitty Clegg becomes maid to Miriam Franklin at the Manor Farm. But she has no idea how far Miriam will stretch her ties of loyalty and duty. Will Kitty's dreams be scattered like chaff upon the wind? Or can she hold on to a very special kind of love which will bring both heartache and joy in the turbulent decades to come?

Josh Retallick, hardy son of a respected Cornish family, and the wild Miriam, daughter of a copper miner, explore together the secret places and wild creatures of Bodmin Moor, unaware that fate will soon sweep them apart. Yet destiny brings them together again through hard and bitter years when the forces of property and power fight to crush the sturdy mining folk who refuse, come what may, to see their spirit broken . . . Book 2 of the 'Retallick' series.

London, 1881: A body is found in the Paddington canal basin, and a woman claims that the remains are those of her missing husband, who disappeared three years ago. Unable to prove her case, she appeals to Frances Doughty to investigate. Frances soon learns that the missing man has secrets of his own, and, when a witness is viciously attacked, it becomes clear that she must choose her allies wisely.

One hundred years after Plague 99, Daniel travels from Cornwall to Croydon. There he meets April and Meta who live in a very different type of community from his own - but which community is right?

Usually I hate hunting, because I'm not a very good rider and I always end up on my bum. But today the hunt was very exciting, and a little scary too! Because there was almost a terrible accident - and it looks as though someone is trying to hurt the Queen.

Could Her Majesty's closest friend, Robert Dudley, really be to blame? As Queen Elizabeth's favourite Maid of Honour, and her very own secret investigator, it's up to me, Lady Grace, to solve this mystery...

Kate is nervous about her new job in a hectic vet's practice, but with the staff and patients keeping her busy any anxieties soon vanish, and before long Kate wants to make changes in other areas of her life!  Book 1 of series.

Heaven is caught up in a sinister web of cruel deceits and hidden passions. Book 2 of series.

It was two years since the marriage of Nick and Karen Radcliffe had ended in a blaze of hatred and misunderstanding, and since then they had not set eyes on one another - but Nick’s beloved adoptive mother didn’t know that; she thought Karen had been in South America with Nick all the time, and now that she was dying and wanted them near her, he was determined that she should not find out. And so Karen found herself forced once again to live with this man who had nothing but contempt for her - and trying desperately to control the longing she still felt for him.

When Jenny's grandfather buys a wild colt, she is both thrilled and horrified. A racing colt is a frightening responsibility, but Jenny's hopes for the horse are clouded by dark family secrets.

A fisherman finds an abandoned baby and takes it home to his childless wife. They raise the child as their own but as she grows it becomes clear that a very different community has claims to her.

When cathedral dean Adam Ayscough encounters clockmaker Isaac Peabody, their unlikely friendship touches the lives of the entire community.

Behind the dean's fearsome reputation lies a humble man crippled by shyness. Desperate to leave behind a lasting legacy of goodness, his only wishes are to serve God and his parishioners, and to be loved by his young and dissatisfied wife.

Haunted by the memories of a miserable childhood, gifted clockmaker Isaac Peabody has spent a lifetime perfecting his craft and rejecting all belief in God.

Despite their fundamental differences, both men find a common understanding, and discover that faith can come in many different guises.

A book for dog lovers, this story is written in the form of letters from an older dog to a young pup advising the youngster on how to achieve a well-trained owner and a comfortable life.

Deep in a Derbyshire valley live two girls, twins, so alike that even their family can't tell them apart. But tragedy is waiting. When the valley is sold to be flooded for a huge dam, the villagers are forced to leave their homes. Deep secrets are uncovered. New characters enter their lives and desires, love and grief come to the surface.

When Melissa is fired from a San Francisco advertising agency she cancels her wedding to Ted and moves to Britain as an au pair to an eccentric aristocratic family. Whilst observing the family in their native habitat, she succumbs to the lure of lemon shortbread and the appeal of a lean and hungry Englishman.

In July 1942, thirteen year old Anne Frank and her family fled from the horrors of Nazi occupation, and went into hiding in an Amsterdam warehouse. Over the next two years Anne vividly describes in her diary the frustration of living in such confined quarters.