Showing results by narrator "Nicolette McKenzie" in All Categories

1933. Esmé Carr travels to Australia with her best friend in search of adventure. Left behind is Esmé's adolescent niece. Meggie Elliot has an imaginative and independent frame of mind, but there is mystery surrounding her birth - one she intends to unravel, despite her mother's warnings to leave the past alone. When the truth surfaces it's not what Meggie wants to hear, and Esmé must reconcile the rift between mother and daughter.

A poignant, touching and epic tale of lost love, set against the drama and danger of World War Two. 1947. One wet and chilly November afternoon a woman stands at the edge of a lake forced into a heartbreaking choice between her past and her future. 2008. Police diver Martha makes an incredible discovery in a local lake of a package containing a series of lost mementoes which reveal a story of intrigue, betrayal and heartbreak. As the threads of the past and present are drawn together, Martha's world, and that of her family, is changed forever.

For more than 50 years, Wendy McCarthy has been on the leading edge of Australian feminism, and her trailblazing advocacy and leadership have made her a widely respected and revered figure: a woman who shaped her times as much as she was shaped by them. Now, at 80 years of age, she shares her remarkable life and achievements. From sheltered country schoolgirl to relentless campaigner for abortion and contraception, from passionate teacher to lifelong advocate for education, Wendy smashed the glass ceiling again and again.

When Adelaide Anson-Gravetty finds out her father is not the man who raised her, she is both shocked and intrigued. Determined to find out more about her new family, she travels to the convent of Our Lady of Mercy in France to meet her aunt, the Reverend Mother. But when France falls to the German army, Adelaide and the nuns are soon in the thick of a war that threatens both their beliefs and their lives. Collaborating with the Resistance, sheltering Jewish orphans, defying the rulings of Vichy France: these are dangerous activities in dangerous times.

Stella and her mother-in-law, Margie, are two very different women. Stella is kind, compassionate and a little chaotic. Margie is prickly and demanding, with bitter memories of the past. When Margie needs help recovering from a major operation, she reluctantly returns to the family farm, where for decades, until Stella's arrival, she was the one in charge. But the two women gradually form an unlikely bond, as the ambitions, secrets, and tragedies that have shaped their lives are slowly uncovered....

A new patient appears on Sigmund Freud's roster. The initial session soon takes a dramatic turn when the man pulls a gun on Freud. The day before, he murdered his own father, and now he demands absolution from the Professor. While Anna contacts Karl and they both hold an emergency session right outside the therapy room in an effort to put an end to the hostage situation, Sigmund tries to use all means at his disposal to persuade the man to surrender before a disaster occurs.

Brenda Ashford is 91 years old and spent 62 years working as a Norland Nanny. Brenda began training at the Norland Institute in 1939 at the age of 18, shortly before war was declared. Even as a nervous young trainee, Brenda was determined to give the children in her care a wonderful childhood. She worked with evacuees from the East End, as well as in the nurseries of smart Kensington homes. She frequently put her life at risk, dashing to air raid shelters with her charges clutched to her chest. But the war was also a time when people pulled together like never before or since.

The number 1 international bestseller. Millie Bird is a seven-year-old girl who always wears red wellington boots to match her red, curly hair. But one day, Millie’s mum leaves her alone beneath the Ginormous Women’s underwear rack in a department store, and doesn’t come back. Agatha Pantha is an eighty-two-year-old woman who hasn’t left her home since her husband died. Instead, she fills the silence by yelling at passers-by, watching loud static on TV, and maintaining a strict daily schedule.

New Zealand, 1921. Bright, feisty, and pretty, 16-year-old Lottie O’Brien lives with her troubled family in an impoverished part of Wellington. Life at home is hard for Lottie, her younger sister Bella and brother Jack – their father has returned from the war a mental and physical invalid, for whom their mother has neither sympathy nor affection. Ambitious Lottie dreams of a better life and is befriended by her class teacher, Madeleine Carson, who introduces Lottie to her affluent family.

The scorching-hot New Year's Eve romp Mia Parker spent with a sexy stranger was reckless, amazing... and never to be repeated. So why did she agree to marry him three years later? Benedict del Castillo had visited the lush Parker Retreat in New Zealand to recover from an injury. He didn't expect to see the one-night stand he'd never forgotten. Nor did he expect to pick up where they'd left off...

Western Australia, 1890. Fourteen-year-old Sarette Maitland is orphaned when her father dies of a snake bite on the goldfields. Left to fend for herself by her father’s villainous partner, she is rescued by a wealthy adventurer, John Kern, and takes the place in his heart of his own dead daughter.

Several years later, he reluctantly sends her back to England, to the manners society expects of a beautiful young woman.

When two little children are murdered and the suspect - the children's mother as well as one of Freud's patients - is arrested, the Professor is compelled into action: he is sure the suspect is innocent. Instead he suspects the children's father committed the murder. He is able to persuade Karl Gruber of his suspicions.

A bank is robbed in Vienna. The constables quickly arrive on the scene - one of the bank robbers is arrested while the others flee with the loot. Karl involves Sigmund in the questioning of the arrested man - the mentally unstable man is the only chance they have to find the other robbers and their spoils.

The Cemetery of the Nameless in Vienna is where those who take their own lives are buried - suicide victims who jumped into the Danube to kill themselves. But when the obvious victim of a murder washes up on the banks of the Danube, Karl initiates a homicide investigation. Supported by Anna and Sigmund, Constable Gruber heads into the world of prostitutes and pimps in Vienna's red-light district.

When an old prison is renovated, the fragile diary of one of the inmates is found. The entries contained detailed information about a series of unsolved murders from a long time ago. With Anna's support, Karl starts to interview former inmates of the prison while Sigmund tries to identify the killer on the basis of the diary entries.

A young girl stands alone in the cobbled market place of a small Lincolnshire town, bedraggled, soaked through and very afraid. Who is she? Where has she come from and from whom is she running away? No one knows or cares. Only kindly farmer, Eddie Appleyard, recognises something in the girl that touches his heart. In a drunken haze and scarcely realising what he is doing, Eddie takes her home even though his wife is a tyrant, who will believe the worst.

It is 1914, and Eveleen Hardcastle, now in in her early thirties, has married Richard. As the First World War breaks out, Eveleen, a sophisticated young woman, is left to manage the factory while Richard goes off to fight for his country. Eveleen's mother Mary has found happiness at last in her marriage to Josh. Her young granddaughter, Bridie, still lives at home, and is beautiful, but has a spirited, strong will which her grandmother finds hard to control.

Castroux, France, 1939. In a bare farmhouse above the village, Oriane lives in desperate poverty. When the Germans invade, her simple world crumbles. Passions erupt, moral boundaries break down , and rebellion is soon in the air. Castroux, France, 2000. In an idyllic gîte overlooking the river, Claudia sunbathes on the terrace. She’s pregnant, trapped, and terrified of the future. She confides only in a reclusive neighbour, Oriane, and discovers that she too carried a shameful secret.

In 1939, Cathy lives happily with her family in Australia, oblivious of the onset of WWII in Europe. In England, young Tom, devastated when his mother leaves the family home in Leeds, is determined to enlist as soon as he is of age. He joins the Royal Navy and is sent to the Far East, arriving in Sydney. Tom meets dance teacher Cathy at a ballroom, and it soon becomes obvious they are destined to be together. But what are their chances of keeping their romance alive when it is inevitable that, once the war is over, Tom must sail back to England?

Hortense Beauharnais finds herself rubbing shoulders with royalty as her mother remarries to become Napoleon Bonaparte's wife. As Napoleon struggles for power on the battlefields of Europe, so Hortense charts her way through the French court - a chessboard world where the motives are jealousy and greed and the prizes are thrones of conquered countries.