The Summer Queen is an evocative and grand historical novel from Margaret Pemberton, the bestselling author of A Season of Secrets and Beneath the Cypress Tree.August 1879, Osborne House. Queen Victoria has occupied the British throne for over forty years. Bringing together her extended family from across Europe offers a chance for old alliances to be strengthened and new unions to be forged.May Teck, daughter of a Duke and Princess, is constantly reminded that she lacks the pedigree to be a true royal. Considering herself an outsider, she finds comfort in meeting two kindred spirits at Osborne; creating a bond with them that she thinks will last forever. Alicky lives in the shadow of her older siblings and has never recovered from the death of her mother. Until she meets Nicky, heir to the Russian throne, who sweeps her off to his homeland where life will never be the same again.And then there is Willy, destined to be the...

'But I don't hate Chung King!' Gianetta cried passionately. 'I love it. I love the temples and pagodas and the plum blossom and the junks on the river. What I hate is only being able to see these things from a distance. I want to visit the temples. I want to walk out on the hills beneath the plum trees. I want to enjoy China, not be protected from it!' Beneath the light of the moon the Chinese Moonflower blooms only one night of the year. No European has seen it blossom, and Zachary Cartwright is determined to do so. Giannetta Hollis, niece of the British Envoy, becomes an uninvited member of the expedition, to travel to the remotest part of China in search of Moonflowers. It is a decision that transforms her life, bringing her more adventure than she had ever dreamed possible, and love beyond her wildest imaginings.

A broken love affair takes Lucy Matthews to the Villa d'Este as governess to the six-year-old Danielle Van de Naude. But instead of a refuge Lucy finds she has entered a world of intrigue and fear. Why did Danielle's previous governess die? Is someone trying to kill her too? Determined to find out, Lucy encounters death and murder as Danielle is kidnapped to thwart her father's political ambitions, and only Lucy can save her life. But who can she trust to help her? Ian Lyall, who watches her so disturbingly? Steve Patterson who wishes to marry her? The suave Bradley Van de Naude, Danielle's step-brother? Or Max Rampling, the man who has her heart but holds another woman in his arms? One of them is a ruthless killer, but who? And why? As Lucy faces death in an attempt to save Danielle, the façades finally drop and the truth is revealed.

Magnolia Square in South London was a friendly and vibrant place to live, not least for Kate Voigt and her father. Carl Voigt had been a WWI prisoner of war who had married a cockney girl and never gone back. Now widowed, he and Kate were part of the London life of the square with all its rumbustious and colourful characters. Then came the war.Suddenly it seemed the Voigts were outcasts because of their German blood. When Carl was interned, Kate's only support was her best friend Carrie, and Toby, the R.A.F. pilot whom she loved. Finally, when Toby was killed, and even Carrie turned against her, she found herself pregnant and totally alone.Late one Christmas evening, during the Blitz, she was approached by a wounded sailor asking for lodgings. Leon Emmerson, like Kate, was also a lonely misfit because if his parentage. It was to be the beginning of a new friendship, of startling and dramatic events in Kate's life. And as the war progressed, as...

Lady Catherine Davencourt is heartbroken when her fiancé is murdered, so she is doubly horrified when the disreputable Dominic, the new Marquis of Clare, offers to marry his brother's bereaved fiancée. Her only escape lies in disguising herself as a governess and fleeing to a position with a Russian family. But on arrival in St Petersburg, she finds that Dominic too has fled England . . . Why is she fated to be thrown into his company? Could she possibly be in love with him—a man she had left England rather than marry, a man who had left England rather than marry her?

A war that could turn friends into enemies, lovers into fighters . . .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, but Ella too feels pulled to the Mediterranean by the promise of freedom. When she meets Christos, life as a country GP's wife seems even less appealing . . . Daphne however throws herself into London's high society, falling madly in love with diplomat and heir Sholto Hertford - but then his work brings them to Crete, and Daphne becomes enchanted by the...

Olivia Harland is enjoying her stay with her aunt and uncle in the Western Hills fifteen miles from Peking. It is 1900 and the air is heavy with the talk of Boxers, the Chinese rebels who are driving the Europeans from China. Adam Ross is a doctor in the Northern Provinces. His Chinese wife has been brutally murdered in a Boxer attack, and he is leaving Peking after depositing his baby son there for safety. As he departs, Olivia rides out into the Western Hills to contemplate a proposal of marriage from handsome young diplomat Phillippe Casanaeve, and it is then that the Boxers attack . . .

1945: The war was over, and the families who lived in Magnolia Square could look forward to their men coming home and their lives returning to normal.But for some, the end of the war brought serious problems. Kate Voigt was at last able to marry Leon Emmerson, the man she loved, a Londoner like herself, but of mixed race. When old man Harvey, a powerful and wealthy figure in South London and great-grandfather to Kate's small son, heard of the match he was determined that young Matthew should not be raised by Leon. Slowly, insidiously, he began the fight to wrest Kate's son away from her.And for Jewish refugee Christina, who had married Jack Robson, a commando and the handsomest man in the Square, the end of the war brought its own special torment. She was convinced that her mother and grandmother had somehow escaped the holocaust and were alive. It seemed that her determination to find them could put everything, even her marriage, at risk.

Accused of witchcraft and hunted by Louis XIV's fanatical Inquisitor, Marietta Riccardi is only rescued from being burned alive by the intervention of Léon de Villeneuve — the Lion of Languedoc. Small wonder that she falls in love with him! Yet Léon is on his way to marry his childhood sweetheart, Elise, and to him Marietta is nothing but a tiresome peasant girl . . . beautiful and seductive perhaps, but an unwelcome distraction from his forthcoming wedding. Marietta knows that she should leave France — escape her persecutors and her hopeless love — yet she cannot tear herself away from Languedoc, or from Léon . . .

Scratch the veneer of opulence at the 'Enclave', a cluster of villas bought for the movie star Rosalind by her millionaire husband, and a reality of fear, frustration, guilt and love betrayed glimmer from beneath. Rosalind's cousin Jenny is there to fight her despair over killing a woman and child in a car accident. The stranger Jonathan is burdened by some darkness in his past. Mary also has something to conceal. When Rosalind is found dead, the knot of intrigue tightens. Blackmail, passion and revenge — each takes its turn in this tautly told story of mystery and malice.

In 1880 the meeting place of international royalty and the twilight world of the demi-monde is the dazzling casino at Monte Carlo. To the young and beautiful Charlotte Grainger, humble companion to Princess Natalya, one figure stands out above Sarah Bernhardt, the Prince of Wales and the crowned heads of Europe — Count Sandor Karolyi, the man referred to as the Devil's Spawn. Can she ever hope to understand the enigmatic Hungarian — a man of wealth and title, of notorious reputation, a man who regards her as mildly amusing? Will she learn the cause of the anguish he is so careful never to show in public, and can she help him to banish forever the past which threatens his future happiness?

June 1944 in occupied France, and the embattled coast of Normandy anxiously awaits the Allied invasion. Lisette de Valmy – just eighteen years old and an ardent member of the Resistance, she is torn between loyalty to the Cause and her love for one man. Dieter Meyer – a German officer, handsome and courageous, he must fight for his country and for his future with Lisette. Greg Dering – generous and warm-hearted, he liberates the de Valmy home but falls captive to the sad beauty of the girl who welcomes him to France. And Luke Brandon – obsessed by Lisette from the start, he can never forget her and his all-consuming passion threatens to destroy them all . . . From the devastation of war-torn France to the glamour and riches of San Francisco, Never Leave Me is a moving story of heartbreak and love and of the destructive legacy of war. '. . . takes off passionately,...