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MY BOOKS
These books were published under the pseudynom Kath Kincaid. They are nothing like my sagas. I think they are referred to as 'Hen Lit' - ie, 'Chick Lit' for the older woman. Orion, who has published all my other books, has agreed to issue them under my real name. I'm not sure when they will be published, but hopefully it will be later this year.
LIVERPOOL 1945. I have only written the first three chapters of this novel. Maggie, Nell and Iris have just been demobbed from the Army and are trying to settle back to civilian life. Maggie is soon to marry the love of her life, but Nell and Iris are finding the lack of excitement in their present life hard to cope with. I've no idea how it will continue, but am really looking forward to finding out.
LIVERPOOL 1937. The Second World War is about to begin when she is approached by the father of an old friend to fetch his daughter, Sara and her family, home from Paris. But while Jessica manages to see Sara and two of her children on to a train, she misses it herself. She experiences the ensuing conflict from across the channel, helping to manage the tiny theatre in which she lives and where desperate refugees shelter from the Germans who have invaded the city. She finds love again and makes friends who will last a life time. The war over, she returns to Liverpool where she finds her children waiting for her. It's not long since I submitted this book to my publisher and I am waiting to hear what they think of it!
LIVERPOOL 1914. Martha Rossi lives in a tenement with her five children and husband Carlo. Despite working all the hours she can, the family don't have much to get by on. When Martha's fourteen-year-old son Joe proudly enlists to fight for his country just to earn his mother an extra weekly shilling, Martha is horrified. She realises the government is turning a blind eye to the scores of young boys who are joining the army. Despite her pleas and protests, Joe is despatched to France within weeks. Unbeknownst to them all, Joe's act of selfless heroism will have huge implications for Martha and all the family. As the dreaded telegrams begin to arrive from the front in France, mothers' hearts are broken across the country. Spurred on by grief of her own, Martha Rossi begins a quest that will take her right to the doors of No.10 Downing Street. Martha's journey there will be a tough one, but with courage and the support of her friends and family, it will be the most important undertaking of her life.
The hardback of this novel has already been published and the paperback comes out in December.
Buy Martha's Journey from Amazon
Brodie Logan's idyllic life with her once-loving husband, Colin, seems to have come to an end. So when she lets out the big house with its enchanting garden where she grew up, she decides to leave Colin and share the house in Liverpool with the other women who have come to live there.
First, there is twenty-five year old Diana, so innocent and childlike, yet terribly practical having raised her three younger brothers to be fine young men. But Diana suddenly finds there is no place for her in the only home she has ever known. Then there is Vanessa, once a successful career woman, now miserable and overweight, who still can't get over the shock of an unexpected rejection. And finally, Rachel, barely fifteen, with her baby daughter, Poppy, who some people seem determined to take away from her.
Buy Nothing Lasts Forever from Amazon
Pretty Amy Curran was just eighteen years old when she met Barney Patterson, the love of her life, on Southport Pier in 1939. Their romanticpassionate marriage was made in heaven, or so they both believed. But when Britain declared war on Germany, Barney volunteered to fight and the couple were eventually separated for five long years. When he returned to Liverpool after VE Day, he wasn't the same person - and neither was Amy.
But how could things have become so twisted that one day Amy would kill her adored husband? And what happened to their little girl, Pearl, just five years old at the time?
In 1971 Amy is released from prison. Her freedom changes the lives of others, not least that of her daughter Pearl, now twenty-five. Amy and Pearl tentatively begin to re-build their relationship. But Pearl doesn't know that Amy has been keeping a terrible secret, one that she will never share with her daughter and which has already wrecked more than one life. As the truth about the past unravels, Amy and Pearl must learn not only the meaning of forgiveness, but also the power of enduring love.
Click here for a clip from the audio book read by Jaqueline King Buy Mother of Pearl from Amazon Buy Mother of Pearl audio book from Amazon
Maggie's once happy marriage has turned sour, leaving her tied to a husband who no longer seems to love her. So she continues to work, keeps in touch with her friends and tries not to think about the lack of love in her life. But all that changes when Maggie meets someone who turns her entire world upside down...
Buy A Dream Come True from Amazon
It is a cold February night in 1925 when two teenage sisters - Mollie and Annemarie Kenny -escape from their home in an Irish village. Their mother has died and the girls have suffered shocking abuse at the hands of the doctor father. With sensitive, creative Annemarie so traumatised she can barely remember her name, Mollie decides they should make a new life for themselves and she takes her younger sister to Liverpool where they will board a ship to New York. There, she thinks they will be safe.
But the smallest, cruellest twist of fate conspires to separate the girls just as the boat is about to sail, leaving Mollie stranded in Liverpool and Annemarie at the mercy of strangers in America. The path their lives take could not be more different - yet both sisters are forced to live with a terrible absence. As the Depression makes way for the edgy l930s, the spectre of another war looms. The Second World War will separate many more people from their loved ones but, as Mollie sees in the camaraderie of blitzed Liverpool, it can also bring people together...
Click here for a clip from the audio book read by Jaqueline King Buy The Leaving of Liverpool from Amazon Buy The Leaving of Liverpool audio from Amazon
At the age of nineteen, Kitty McCarthy has decided she is going to live a life less ordinary - although
she doesn't know quite how to go about it. What she does know is that she doesn't want to get married and raise children
in Liverpool like her elder sisters - Claire, who is a mother-hen, easy-going Norah and elegant Aileen. But Kitty's
resolve is tested by the unexpected direction her life takes. What will she gain by swimming against the tide?
The combination of an impetuous youthful decision and a chance meeting twenty years later are to have momentous repercussions that will stay with her forever. As she bounces through the years, wryly accepting that regrets and mistakes are all part of life, it is her sisters who are the constant thread when other relationships have come and gone. They know her best, they say, and in the end what is best for her - although Kitty would almost certainly disagree.
Buy Kity and her Sisters from Amazon
On a rainy September night in 1920, Brenna Caffrey, her husband, and their two young
sons arrive at Liverpool docks from Ireland. They have come in search of a better life, but there is no one
to meet them, as had been arranged, and they have nowhere to live. Then Brenna, who is expecting her third
child, goes into labour. Collapsing on the steps of a grand townhouse, she is taken in by Nancy Gates, housekeeper
to the wealthy Allardyce family who live there. Upstairs, the unhappily married Eleanor Allardyce is also struggling
to give birth. Both women produce daughters that night - Cara and Sybil, the September Girls. Enemies at first,
Brenna and Eleanor eventually become friends, but friendship between their children is another matter.
Nineteen years later, at the start of the Second World War, Cara and Sybil find themselves
thrown together in Malta, military key to the Mediterranean, a time that has life-changing repercussions for
them both. And back home in Liverpool, the bombs pour down on a defiant city.
Buy September Girls from Amazon
Victoria Macara is twenty-seven and lives alone in the old house in the corner of what had once been her great-grandfather’s removal business. When the land is sold, she finds herself surrounded by a small estate of new properties called Victoria Mews. Although she’d been about to leave Liverpool and start a new life in New York, Victoria wishes she could stay when she makes loads of friends – and meets Gareth Moran, the love of her life. The newcomers bring with them their own dramas. The mismatched Kathleen and Steve are lovers with broken marriages behind them: Rachel is attempting to escape from a terrible tragedy: upper-class Sarah arrives with her children after running away from an abusive husband and Anna and Ernie are just looking for a quiet life. For Marie Jordan, Victoria Mews is a refuge from the men who murdered her husband: for Judy Moon, it means a fresh start after forty years of marriage to a man she’d thought she’d love forever. Rachel, desperate for friends, decides to hold a barbeque and, during the days leading up to this, various events take place that lead to an explosive situation and the barbeque becomes a time for truth telling and revealing secrets that have been hidden for years.
Buy Old House on the Corner from Amazon
It is Liverpool, 1939. The Second World War is about to start when pretty Laura Oliver meets Queenie Todd. Laura is twenty-one and happily married to the dashing Roddy. Plain, inadequate Queenie is only fourteen and has been deserted by her mother who has gone to London in search of a good time. The two become good friends, along with the big-hearted Vera Monaghan across the street. When the air raids begin, the older women trust Queenie sufficiently to put their small daughters, Hester and Mary, into her care. The three young people are evacuated to Caerdovey, a small town on the coast of Wales. At first, Caerdovey is a haven of peace and quiet. The girls have a wonderful time until something happens, so terrifying, that it will haunt them for the rest of their lives. An entirely different Queenie has emerged from the conflict: beautiful now and confident, she works for Frederick & Hughes, known locally as Freddy’s, the most exclusive shop in Liverpool, where a dazzling career awaits her as well as a love that will last a lifetime. Laura, now with a second child, has an unpredictable future to face and things take a most unexpected turn.
Buy Queen of the Mersey from Amazon
It is the heady sixties and Liverpool is the place to be. The Flowers, the Baileys and the McDowds are three very different Liverpool families bound together by just one thing: music. The children are determined to be part of the glamour that surrounds Liverpool so, when Sean, Lachlan and Max form The Merseysiders and Jeannie and Rita become part of The Flower Girls, they put their hearts and souls into achieving success beyond their wildest dreams. The greatest star of all is Sean McDowd, adored by women everywhere, yet unable to get his first love out of his mind. But Jeannie Flowers has married Lachlan and no one is prepared for the deceits and betrayals that lie ahead. When Sean promised to do anything in the world for her, neither had the first notion of what she would need him to do… A moment of weakness changed Jeannie’s life, but that which followed was a deliberate act of betrayal that she could not possibly expect Lachlan to forgive.
Buy Lime Street Blues from Amazon
Ruby O’Hagan never knew her parents: she was taken from her mother at birth and her father, a soldier killed in the Great War, never even knew of her existence. Brought up in a convent, at fourteen Ruby is chosen to be a lady’s companion in a grand house near Liverpool. But this new life is not to last and before long Ruby finds herself in the slums of Liverpool, alone with two children to support. Then, with the outbreak of the Second World War, Ruby’s life takes a dramatic new turn when she is asked to look after a large house. The house becomes a refuge – not just for Ruby and her family, but for many others, as loves, triumphs, sorrows and friendships are played out in the House by Princes Park.
Buy The House by Princes Park from Amazon
Alice Lacey couldn’t be more different from her sister-in-law, the bitter, ambitious Cora. And when both women give birth to sons on one chaotic night in Liverpool in 1940, Cora’s jealousy and resentment prompt her into an action with the most far-reaching consequences. Alice’s own happiness is soured when her husband, disfigured in an accident, turns against his family. As her marriage slowly begins to disintegrate, Alice looks for a life outside her home, and decides to buy the tiny hairdressers where she works. But to do this, she must first borrow money from Cora… Laceys of Liverpool is a compelling story of tangled family relationships – and devastating secrets.
Buy Laceys of Liverpool from Amazon
For Josie Flynn, life with her beautiful, wayward mother in the heart of Liverpool was all she ever wanted – until Hitler’s bombs ripped her childhood apart. But the war was just the start of a journey – a journey that began in heartbreak when Josie was sent to live with her miserable Aunt Ivy and over-friendly Uncle Vince; took her to Barefoot House as the paid companion of an elderly, cantankerous woman who eventually became her friend, and seemed to promise life-long happiness in New York with the handsome, charismatic Jack Coltrane. But once again, life is not turning out the way Josie imagines and she finds herself back in Liverpool, alone. As she renews old loves and former friendships, and reflects on her time at Barefoot house, she embarks upon a career which is as unlikely as it is successful.
Buy The Girl from Barefoot House from Amazon
When Millie Cameron is asked to sort through the belongings of her Aunt Flo who recently died, she is not at all happy. She hardly knew her aunt and, besides, Millie has a busy life and her own career to think of. She certainly wants nothing to do with the seemingly dull, spinster aunt the family refuse to talk about. However, Millie seems to have little choice but to go to Flo’s basement flat and begin the tedious task. But as dusk falls and Millie sorts through her aunt’s collection of photographs, letters and newspaper cuttings, her interest is surprisingly awakened. Millie finds herself embarking on a journey – a journey to a past which includes a lost lover and a secret child. And, picking through the tangled web of Flo’s life, Millie makes the startling discovery that all the threads lead to a shocking conclusion…
Buy Dancing in the Dark from Amazon
Annie Harrison’s Liverpool childhood is full of contrasts. From the happy, crowded atmosphere of her uncle and aunt’s house to the lonely seclusion of life with her reclusive mother, she eventually goes to live at the Grand hotel with her rich school friend, Sylvia. Yet life is full of excitement too, as she discovers rock’n’roll at the Cavern Club and hears the Beatles play live for the first time. Then, just as Annie seems to be settling down to a comfortable life of marriage and motherhood, fate deals her an unexpected blow, leaving her to draw on resources she didn’t know she possessed. As she struggles to cope amidst almost overwhelming odds, a chance meeting leads to events she has no control over. Could this be Annie’s chance for happiness?
Buy Liverpool Annie from Amazon
It is 1941, and the war has already irrevocably changed the lives of all who live on Pearl Street, Bootle. The German bombers have left rubble in their wake and everyone pulls together to come to terms with the loss of loved ones. Sisters Eileen and Sheila share the anxious burden of absent husbands and Kitty Quigley joins the war effort in becoming an auxiliary nurse. Struggling to earn a living and with a baby daughter to support, Jessica Fleming teams up with Rita Mott who is enjoying the glamour and excitement of the Yanks while her soldier husband is overseas.
Buy Through the Storm from Amazon
September 1940 – the cruellest year of war for Britain’s civilians as the Luftwaffe mercilessly blitz their cities. In Pearl Street, near to Liverpool’s vital docks, families struggle to cope the best they can. A nasty surprise for ever-cheerful dressmaker Brenda Mahon and flighty Sean’s love for little Alice show how life goes on even when it appears to be falling apart. Yet while Eileen Costello tries to hide her ruined hopes of happiness with Nick and do her best by the husband she hoped had gone forever, Ruth Singerman returns having escaped from Austria. Even the joy of seeing her father again cannot make up for the bitter loss of her children. This new novel in the series of sagas follows the fortunes of one street through the bitterness of disappointment, the warmth of friendship and the pain of loss as the war tests the indomitable spirit of the people of Liverpool.
Buy Liverpool on Fire from Amazon   LIGHTS
OUT LIVERPOOL (1995)
The residents of Pearl Street, Liverpool, are having a street party, but a shadow hangs over the festivities. It is l939 and Britain is on the brink of war. For Annie, the outbreak of war means constant worry for her twin boys, already sent to France. And for Sheila, the birth of her sixth child is eclipsed by fear for her husband’s safety as he faces the daily threat of U-boat attack. Her sister, Eileen, whose marriage is not all she had hoped for, finds that work in a munitions factory brings far more than a much-needed wage. But the war brings other changes too: when Freda and Dicky, the grubby, least-cared-for children in the neighbourhood are evacuated, their new lives change them beyond recognition – and their mother finds it is not easy to bring them home.
Buy Lights Out Liverpool from Amazon
Lizzie O’Brien was born into a large, boisterous family, determined to stay together in Liverpool despite the nightly bombing raids of the Second World War. But for Lizzie, childhood innocence is haunted by a dark shadow. Even her mother’s devotion and the love of her brothers cannot drive out the spectre that is ruining her life – her brute of a father, who sees her as a dark cuckoo invading his family of blond sons. At sixteen, Lizzie runs away to London – the first of her stepping stones towards freedom and a new life of her own. She believes the past and its nightmares are locked away tight, and only a glorious future remains, of friendships forged for a lifetime and a glittering new career as an actress set for Hollywood. But the past is hurrying to catch up with her, threatening to destroy her dreams. A lonely, frightened thirteen-year-old girl is sobbing to her through the years and she can no longer ignore the truth…
Buy Stepping Stones from Amazon
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Liverpool images
by kind permission of The Mersey Partnership (TMP) |
