Headline The Letter Хьюз Кэтрин

A hidden note. A lost love. A second chance • 'A wonderful, enthralling story; one that I didn't want to end' Lesley Pearse on The Key • 'A heartbreakingly powerful read'The Sun on The Key • From the #1 bestselling author of The Letter, Kathryn Hughes, comes The Key, an unforgettable story of a heartbreaking secret that will stay with you for ever • 1956 • It's Ellen Crosby's first day as a student nurse at Ambergate Hospital. When she meets a young woman admitted by her father, little does Ellen know that a choice she will make is to change both their lives for ever • 2006 • Sarah is drawn to the now abandoned Ambergate. Whilst exploring the old corridors she discovers a suitcase belonging to a female patient who entered Ambergate fifty years earlier

Mary has been nursing a secret • Forty years ago, she made a choice that would change her world for ever, and alter the path of someone she holds dear • Beth is searching for answers. She has never known the truth about her parentage, but finding out could be the lifeline her sick child so desperately needs. When Beth finds a faded newspaper cutting amongst her mother's things, she realises the key to her son's future lies in her own past. She must go back to where it all began to unlock...The Secret

A groundbreaking account of what it was like to live in a Victorian body from one of our best historians • Why did the great philosophical novelist George Eliot feel so self-conscious that her right hand was larger than her left? • Exactly what made Darwin grow that iconic beard in 1862, a good five years after his contemporaries had all retired their razors? • Who knew Queen Victoria had a personal hygiene problem as a young woman and the crisis that followed led to a hurried commitment to marry Albert? • What did John Sell Cotman, a handsome drawing room operator who painted some of the most exquisite watercolours the world has ever seen, feel about marrying a woman whose big nose made smart people snigger? • How did a working-class child called Fanny Adams disintegrate into pieces in 1867 before being reassembled into a popular joke, one we still reference today, but would stop, appalled, if we knew its origins? • Kathryn Hughes follows a thickened index finger or deep baritone voice into the realms of social history, medical discourse, aesthetic practise and religious observance - it's language is one of admiring glances, cruel sniggers, an implacably turned back

People disappear. Secrets remain • 1940: In south-west Ireland, the young and beautiful Lady Charlotte Rathmore is pronounced dead after she mysteriously disappears by the lake of Blackwater Hall. In London, on the brink of the Blitz, Nancy Rathmore is grieving Charlotte's death when a letter arrives containing a secret that she is sworn to keep - one that will change her life for ever • 2019: Decades later, Ellie Fitzgerald is forced to leave Dublin disgraced and heartbroken. Abandoning journalism, she returns to rural Kerry to weather out the storm. But, when she discovers a faded letter, tucked inside the pages of an old book, she finds herself drawn in by a long-buried secret. And as Ellie begins to unravel the mystery, it becomes clear that the letter might hold the key to more than just Charlotte's disappearance

The Thousand Lights Hotel is the gorgeous new novel from Emylia Hall, author of Richard and Judy Summer Pick THE BOOK OF SUMMERS. Set in idyllic Italy, it's the perfect holiday read, for fans of Louise Douglas and Hannah Richell • When Kit loses her mother in tragic circumstances, she feels drawn to finally connect with the father she has never met. That search brings her to the Thousand Lights Hotel, the perfect holiday escape perched upon a cliff on the island of Elba. Within this idyllic setting a devastating truth is brought to light: shaking the foundations upon which the hotel is built, and shattering the lives of the people within it • A heartbreaking story of loss, betrayal, and redemption, told with all the warmth and beauty of an Italian summer

The locals of the Cornish village of Polperran are grieving the sudden loss of Bea Kimbrel, a cornerstone of their small community • Now her reclusive, estranged daughter Alice has turned up, keen to tie up Bea's affairs and move on • But Alice receives a strange bequest from Bea - a collection of unfinished tasks to help out those in Polperran most in need • As each little act brings her closer to understanding her mother, it also begins to offer Alice the courage to open her clamped-shut heart. Perhaps Bea's project will finally unlock the powerful secrets both women have been keeping • The Kindness Project will draw you deep into the lives of two compelling women who should never have missed their chance to say goodbye. It will break your heart - and piece it back together again

The gritty new mystery in Quintin Jardine's bestselling Bob Skinner series, set in Edinburgh and the Scottish countryside; not to be missed by readers of Ian Rankin and Peter May • Nine years ago, divorcee Marcia Brown took her own life. A pillar of the community, she had been accused of theft, and it's assumed that she was unable to live with the shame. Now her former husband wants the case reopened. Marcia was framed, he says, to prevent her exposing a scandal. He wants justice for Marcia. And Alex Skinner, Solicitor Advocate, and daughter of retired Chief Constable Sir Robert Skinner, has taken on the brief, aided by her investigator Carrie McDaniels • When tragedy strikes and his daughter comes under threat, Skinner steps in. His quarry is about to discover that the road to hell is marked by bad intentions

Tara Richards was just a girl when she lost her mother. Years later when Tara receives a letter from a London solicitor its contents shake her to the core. Someone has left her a key to a safe deposit box. In the box lies an object that will change everything Tara thought she knew and lead her on a journey to deepest Spain in search of the answers that have haunted her for forty years • Violet Skye regrets her decision to travel abroad leaving her young daughter behind. As the sun dips below the mountains, she reminds herself she is doing this for their future. Tonight, 4th June 1978, will be the start of a new life for them. This night will indeed change Violet's destiny, in the most unexpected of ways

‘I don’t believe in fate,’ Holly whispered • ‘Really?’ Jack asked. He reached up and his thumb caressed her cheek, softly. ‘Even after all this?’ • Every December, Holly writes to a stranger who is spending Christmas alone. And every year she receives a letter from another lonely person. Being a part of the Dear Stranger club is a tradition she has come to treasure. Because ever since the accident three years ago, Holly has spent Christmas alone • Usually, the letters go unanswered. But when Holly reads this year’s Christmas letter, from an older woman called Emma, she feels compelled to find her, as Emma mentions a place Holly knows all too well • Holly offers to help Emma reconnect with her estranged grandson. But when Holly tracks down handsome, dark-eyed Jack, she realises she’s met him once before, and the connection was electric

People disappear. Secrets remain • 1940: In south-west Ireland, the young and beautiful Lady Charlotte Rathmore is pronounced dead after she mysteriously disappears by the lake of Blackwater Hall • In London, on the brink of the Blitz, Nancy Rathmore is grieving Charlotte's death when a letter arrives containing a secret that she is sworn to keep - one that will change her life for ever • 2019: Disgraced young journalist Ellie Fitzgerald flees Dublin for the safety of rural Kerry. When she discovers a faded letter, tucked inside the pages of an old book from Blackwater Hall, she finds herself drawn in by the mystery of Lady Charlotte's disappearance, and uncovers a long-buried secret

It begins with the discovery of a tattered photo, a letter and a tiny leather shoe… • World War Two, Poland. Alina and Tomasz are childhood sweethearts. The night before he leaves for college, Tomasz proposes marriage. But when their village falls to the Nazis, Alina doesn’t know if Tomasz is alive or dead • 2019. Life changed beyond recognition for Alice when her son, Eddie, was born with autism spectrum disorder. She must do everything to support him, but at what cost to her family? When her cherished grandmother is hospitalised, a hidden box of mementoes reveals a tattered photo of a young man, a tiny leather shoe and a letter. Her grandmother begs Alice to return to Poland to see what became of those she held dearest. In Poland, separated from her family, Alice begins to uncover the story her grandmother is so desperate to tell, and discovers a love that bloomed in the winter of 1942

Beth Lowe has been sent a parcel • Inside is a letter informing her that her long-estranged mother has died, and a scrapbook Beth has never seen before. Entitled The Book of Summers, it's stuffed with photographs and mementos complied by her mother to record the seven glorious childhood summers Beth spent in rural Hungary • It was a time when she trod the tightrope between separated parents and two very different countries; her bewitching but imperfect Hungarian mother and her gentle, reticent English father; the dazzling house of a Hungarian artist and an empty-feeling cottage in deepest Devon. And it was a time that came to the most brutal of ends the year Beth turned sixteen • Since then, Beth hasn't allowed herself to think about those years of her childhood