Catherine Cookson

For seventeen-year-old Brid Stevens, the day began with such promise. At four o?clock on a summer morning, her alarm clock roused her from a dream-filled sleep. She had an appointment to keep with Joe Lloyd whom she had met at the weekly dance. On the cliff-top at Stockwell Hill, overlooking the sea, they were to watch the sun come up. But upon her return home, where she lived with her parents and her brother, all hell was let loose. Harry Palmer...

Hamilton is Maisie's childhood imaginary friend. As she grows up in Tyneside, Maisie writes about him, giving her the chance to broaden her horizons.

In the days of mourning following the death of her second husband Nardy, Maisie took comfort from the company of the little boy called Harold. Now a year on, she has decided to adopt him, to the delight of his family and Harold himself.

Some women are destined to arouse in men either fierce hatred or insatiable desire. Such a woman was Katie Mulholland ... At 15, a scullery maid in the house of the Rosires, she had been raped by the master. Now, many years later, she had enough money to maintain three carriages if she wanted to, and she was on her way to see Bernard Rosier under very different circumstances. There was no pride in Katie Mulholland's heart, however, only fear, for...