Showing results by narrator "Colleen Prendergast" in All Categories

Lifting the Fire Hydrant Lid follows idealistic young recruit Kate Fullen as she negotiates training school and settles into life on the watch. With incidents and routine tasks woven into the fabric of the story, it describes the consuming pressure, emotional turmoil and unpredictable nature of the job. Utilising the rare perspective of a northern, queer, working-class female firefighter, Lifting the Fire Hydrant Lid examines the more intricate difficulties experienced by minority groups and gives a voice to a profession that is seldom heard and rarely seen.

Quinn and Piper are twins, but they've never met. Quinn has been trained to never tell a lie. Piper is a practiced liar. One twin can command the darkness; the other could hold the key to breaking the family curse. When they meet at their mother's funeral, their quest to learn truths that have been concealed from them begins, but they're shadowed by a dark spell that beckons them to run at night with a pack of murdering ghost hounds. Suspense, menace, mystery, witchcraft, family secrets, mistaken identity, and romance are interwoven in this brilliantly written novel.

Thirty-two-year-old Catherine Hope has a great memory. But she can't remember everything. She can't remember her ninth year, or when her insomnia started. And she can't remember why everyone stopped calling her Catherine-Maria. With a promiscuous past, and licking her wounds after a breakup, Catherine wonders why she resists anything approaching real love. But when she loses her home to the devastating deluge of 2007 and volunteers at Flood Crisis, a devastating memory emerges.

As a palliative care nurse, it is Kelly Critcher's job to look death in the eye - to save a patient while the fight can still be won and confront death with grace and kindness when it can't. In early 2020, everything changed for nurses on the NHS frontline. Working on Covid wards and the High Dependency Unit, Kelly spent the height of the coronavirus crisis at Northwick Park Hospital - perhaps the UK hospital most deeply ravaged by the illness.

Let's face it, you work for the best years of your life and spend most of your waking hours on the job, so make sure you are energized, fulfilled, and buzzing. Switched On will help you leap outside your comfort zone and awaken your creativity. Switched On shows you how to think like an entrepreneur—have ideas, spot the opportunities, see the future, and make things happen. The future belongs to fresh thinkers, so turn your receptors on and get ready to bring the real you to work.

Sebastian James Murphy is 20 years, six months and two days old. He loves swimming, fried eggs and Billy Ocean. Sebastian is autistic. And lonely. Veronica wants her son Sebastian to be happy. She wants the world to accept him for who he is. She is also thinking about paying a professional to give him what he desperately wants. Violetta is a high-class escort, who steps out into the night thinking only of money.

When a violent murder shatters the otherwise peaceful idyll of Andaby near Hebden Bridge, DS Charlotte Banks can't help but suspect that her brother Ewan—recently released from prison and now living in Calderdale—is behind it. Ewan claims he's innocent, and even has an alibi to prove it, but DS Banks isn't convinced. So much so that she turns to the only people who can help her in an investigation this personal: Kitt Hartley and Grace Edwards, of Hartley and Edwards Investigations.

A serial killer is loose in Yorkshire and has claimed three victims in three months. Eleven days before each murder, a large purple V is painted on the front door of the victim's house. The victims, all of whom have some association with the occult, are found drained of blood with two red marks on their neck. When Ruby Barnett comes home one evening to find a large purple V on her front door, it becomes clear she is the so-called Vampire Killer's next victim.

One warm spring evening, five teenagers meet in a local park. Only four will come out alive. Six months after the stabbing of 15-year-old Deanna Barker, someone is coming after the teenagers of Stockleigh, as a spate of vicious assaults rocks this small community. Revenge for Deanna? Or something more? Detective Eden Berrisford is locked into a race against time to catch the twisted individual behind the attacks - but when her own niece, Jess Mountford, goes missing, the case gets personal.

A killer is on the loose, attacking people in places they feel most safe: their workplaces, their homes. It’s up to DS Grace Allendale to stop the murders and prove herself to her new team. All clues lead to local crime family the Steeles, but that’s where things get complicated. Because the Steeles aren’t just any family, they’re Grace’s family. Two brothers and two sisters, connected by the violent father only Grace and her mother escaped. To catch the killer, Grace will have to choose between her team and her blood. But whom do you trust when both sides are out to get you?

A Mother's Sorrow is a heart-rending family drama set around WW1 from bestselling author and Queen of the Saga, Margaret Dickinson. Three young women. Two families united. A bond that can’t be broken . . . Sheffield, 1892. Patrick Halliday rules his family with a rod of iron. He’s hard on...

Kate seems to have it all – wonderful friends, a successful career, and an idyllic life in the quirky Yorkshire town of Essendale. But under the surface, Kate is lonely and yearns for family – especially at Christmas. With the holidays approaching and the town desperate to attract more visitors, Kate plans an enchanting living Advent calendar to feature the local businesses. But Kate’s picture-perfect plans take an unexpected turn when her ex-boyfriend returns, determined to create the pivotal Christmas Eve display. Will she let go of the past and embrace the future she dreams of?

Former investment banker Johan Golding - Joe to his friends - is the newest member of the Hartley and Edwards Investigations team. And he's thrilled to be shadowing Kitt Hartley, librarian-turned-top sleuth, and her right-hand woman Grace Edwards; even if it means adjusting to the low-level madness that seems to reign in the Hartley and Edwards offices. But Joe finds himself thrown in at the deep end when a man known as Ralph Holmes goes missing on the outskirts of Carlisle.

Private Investigator Kitt Hartley and her twin sister, Rebecca, are preparing for a holiday in Scotland when cruise ship entertainer Errol Jackson appears at the door. Errol breaks the news that Bryce Griffin, a former smuggler and an old friend of Kitt's, has been murdered; his body found washed up by a lighthouse, bearing a gunshot wound. Kitt persuades Rebecca to cancel their trip, and, together with Kitt's assistant, Grace Edwards, and best friend, Evie Bowes, book onto the next cruise to Norway to help with the ongoing murder investigation.

In this romantic comedy series, a debt-ridden, hopelessly single woman tries to get her finances and her love life back on track. Who ever said life was easy? Sophie Drew is thirty, single, and stuck in a dead-end job. She's convinced everyone around her has their lives in order while she's...

Bella Whittington’s caviar-and-Cristal life comes crashing down when she walks in on her fiancé and best friend tangled up in page 34 of the Kama Sutra, limbs everywhere. But her plan to dull the pain with Daddy’s credit card is totaled by the news that they’ve lost the family business. Suddenly, Bella’s both single and completely broke. Shivering in her dingy, new studio apartment, after a traumatic incident with a homemade turmeric face mask (Hello Tangerina Jolie!), Bella realizes she must pull up her Gucci socks and get a job, fast.

When a young boy falls from a balcony in a block of flats, DS Grace Allendale witnesses the shocking aftermath of the tragic event. But strangely, no one will admit to seeing anything - and the parents will only tell the police that it was an accident. Determined to sort the truth from the lies, Grace is thrown into a case that takes her to the darkest corners of the criminal world - and strikes closer to home than she could have ever imagined.

Welcome to the Shop of Impossible Ice Creams! Step inside to discover a delicious world of magical adventure, from bestselling author Shane Hegarty. The final story in this comic, heart-warming illustrated series, for 7+ fans of The Nothing to See Here Hotel and Charlie Changes into a Chicken...

From the top-ten bestselling author of One Snowy Night, Rita Bradshaw, comes The Storm Child, a sweeping family saga set during the run up to WW2 in the north-east of England. It’s mid-winter, and in the throes of a fierce blizzard Elsie Redfern and her husband discover an unknown girl in...

Halifax, 1876. On the death of her mother and sister, Isabelle Gibson is left to fend for herself and her brother in a privately run workhouse. After the matron's son attacks her, Isabelle decides to escape by agreeing to marry a farmer she has never met. But Farrell is a drunkard and in constant feud with his landlord, Ethan Harrington. When he deserts her, Isabelle and Ethan are thrown together. But both are married and must hide their growing love.