Showing results by author "Josephine Cox" in All Categories

Don't miss the brand new epic family drama from the nation’s favourite storyteller… Will a dark shadow destroy her family? As a servant below stairs at the big manor house, Rose dreams of running her own teashop one day, and carefully saves a few shillings each week from the money she sends...

On a moonlit night in 1898, Kathleen Wyman lies in labour at Bessington Hall. Her husband, Edward, is sure that she has been unfaithful to him. In his blind, jealous rage he later gives away the baby to gypsy Rona Parrish, summoned to help with the delivery. Kathleen, frenzied with grief, is soon after locked away in an asylum.

Blackburn, 1947. In the tiny front parlour 14-year-old Laura Blake watches her beloved father die. But not before he tells her she will make something of her life. Laura never forgets his words. Yet her path to success proves to be a rocky one. Forced to trundle a cart around the back streets, selling other folk's cast-offs to support her family, Laura learns enough to start work in her uncle's furniture shop. But then fate deals another cruel blow when Laura is brutally raped. Bearing the child of her attacker in secret, she vows to make the world pay for its injustice towards her.

Lizzie Miller worries for her family – money is short in their little house, but her beautiful daughter Ruby vows to give them all a better life. Working as a maid for Mr Banks, Ruby befriends his shy and gentle daughter, Cicely. The two girls hatch a mischievous plan to introduce Ruby to society at a party for the ‘gentry’ of Blackburn, where Ruby meets Luke Arnold, the dissolute heir to his father’s fortunes.

Vagabonds is the final instalment of Josephine Cox's best-selling Emma Grady trilogy, which finds the heroine content, yet still struggling with the ghosts of her past. 1885. Ex-convict Emma Grady has returned to her hometown of Blackburn and been reunited with her lover Marlow. Now married, with a beautiful home, loving husband and wonderful son, she is still haunted by the past, unable to forget the cruelty of her uncle Caleb Crowther, who ignored her desperate pleas to save her and her tragic first-born.

Another page-turning story of tragedy and triumph from the No.1 bestselling author of The Loner and The Journey. With her shy smile and kind nature, she fits into the family easily. When Nancy Arnold’s eldest son Frank begins to show an interest in the new arrival, she believes that at long...

The brand new epic family drama from the nation’s favourite storyteller. Where can a daughter turn when her father’s love is stolen away? When heart-broken Sarah Quinn is left to care for her father and siblings when her mother dies, it’s hard to watch their loving dad, Fred, drift into...

The new novel from Sunday Times bestselling author Josephine Cox – the master storyteller. Sometimes you just need the courage to tell the truth… Although she's surrounded by a loving family, Marie feels lost: living with a lie can be very lonely. Marie has been carrying a secret for years...

Nell Reece has never known her mother, and her father's burden of guilt about his wife has kept him cowed for years, working as a common labourer on his sister's farm. For all her aunt's spiteful attempts to break Nell's independent spirit, she has never succeeded. But now Nell, pregnant and alone, is forced to leave behind the men in her life, believing she might never be able to return. With little but the clothes she wears, she travels across the Bedfordshire countryside of 1890. When she encounters a scruffy urchin called Kit, she takes him under her wing.

Despite a deathbed warning from her beloved mother, Phoebe Mulligan has no choice but to throw herself on the mercy of her uncle, Edward. Wrenched from all she holds dear, the tragic young girl is delivered to Blackburn town, where she must live in a household terrorised by the cold, forbidding presence of her mother's brother. Phoebe cannot understand why she is treated so harshly by Edward Dickens. She is not to know the guilty secret that lies in his past, a secret that casts a sinister shadow over his feelings for his lovely niece.

Ada Williams once believed money and power would bring her happiness. But now she is all alone except for her greedy son Peter, who waits only for the day he will inherit her fortune. Ada, however, has a different plan altogether. A few miles away in Blackburn, the Bolton family may be poor – but the love they share means they can overcome almost any adversity. But no one could foresee the shocking events of Christmas night 1932, which split the family asunder, leaving Larry crippled and the twins, Ellie and Betsy, in a foster home.

As winter tightens its grip, who can she trust? As the dark nights draw in, secrets hide in the shadows… When Betsy Strong’s mother marries a cruel man, her happy family life is shattered, and Betsy is forced to flee. Seeking refuge with her godmother at her isolated Yorkshire cottage, she...

'You're everything to me. I'd have to lose my life before I'd lose you.' This is the vow Silas made to Cathleen on the day he asks her to marry him. Throughout their childhood their love has grown stronger and now, in 1900, they start to plan a life together. But a jealous woman is determined to ruin their happiness and uses Silas's father – a good and honest man – to do so, forcing him to make an impossible sacrifice. As a dutiful son, Silas has no choice but to obey his father, and Cathleen must pay the bitter price.

Ten years ago, Louise Hunter's life was torn apart by tragedy. Her husband, Ben, killed himself; her brother-in-law, Jacob, was murdered; and her sister, Susan, abandoned her newborn daughter, revealing the baby is Ben's child. Louise remains haunted by guilt over the one night she spent with Ben's friend Eric and refuses to return Eric's love. But after adopting Jinnie, she finds new happiness – until Susan decides she wants Jinnie back.

Robert Sullivan has been left to raise three-year-old Nancy and her seven-year-old brother Jack by himself.Unable to cope, Robert is driven to abandon his children to those he believes can provide them with a better life. However, he quickly has a change of heart and decides to go back for them. But on the way there, he is involved in a horrific accident.

One winter's night, in the coal-hole in her yard, Rosie finds that a woman sheltering there has been severely beaten by thugs. At a glance, Kathleen looks like an unkempt, aged vagabond who tramps the roads carrying all her worldly possessions in a grubby tapestry bag. Her only friend is the mangy old dog who accompanies her; the sum of her life is in the diaries she so zealously guards. Yet close up, Rosie can see that Kathleen has a gracious beauty – the 'look' of a respectable lady of means.

>No-one thought she had the courage.… Those looking in from the outside think Lucy Lovejoy's life is like any other, but at the centre of her family there is a big empty hole where all the love and warmth should be. Over the years, her children have watched while their father chipped away at Lucy's self-confidence. Now the children are following their own paths, and Lucy has never felt more alone. When tragedy strikes at the heart of the family, it's a wake-up call for Lucy. Everyone has taken a little piece of her, and she isn't sure who she is anymore.

Powerful, hard-hearted Leonard Mears ruthlessly presides over his wife and children, exiling them from the outside world and brutally punishing any disobedience. But he is also a man with a dark secret – an illegitimate daughter that he forced his sister to bring up. The girl is now a young woman who, unbeknownst to him, is determined to find the father that abandoned her.

Sonny Fareham's lover – and also her boss – is the charismatic Tony Bridgeman, a successful and ruthless man who usually gets what he wants. But for Sonny, the affair that has promised a future of hope and happiness must end in desperate fear. Late one evening, Sonny overhears a private conversation between Tony Bridgeman and his wife. Only then does she realise she is in great danger.

Beautiful Eva Bereton has two close friends: Patsy, whom she looks upon as a sister, and Bill, her childhood sweetheart, now married and living far away. So when a tragic accident turns Eva’s world upside down, Patsy is the only one she can turn to. A hated figure from the past comes to reclaim the farm and business that Eva had always believed belonged to her parents. And not even Bill, still in love with Eva, can stop her being thrown out onto the streets. With no choice but to leave, Eva and Patsy decide to build a new life elsewhere.