Showing results by narrator "Anna Cordell" in All Categories

The World by Simon Sebag Montefiore is a fresh and original history of humanity, unlike any previous world history: it uses family, the one thing all humans have in common, to tell the story. It is genuinely global, spanning all eras and all continents, from the perspective of places as diverse as Haiti, Congo and Cambodia as well as Europe, China and America.       

Julian Jessop, an eccentric, lonely artist and septuagenarian believes that most people aren’t really honest with each other. But what if they were? And so he writes - in a plain, green journal - the truth about his own life and leaves it in his local café. It’s run by the incredibly tidy and efficient Monica, who furtively adds her own entry and leaves the book in the wine bar across the street. Before long, the others who find the green notebook add the truths about their own deepest selves - and soon find each other In Real Life at Monica’s Café.

On Yom Kippur, 1944, fighting to stay alive as a prisoner in Auschwitz, Lily Ebert made a promise to herself. She would survive the hell she was in and tell the world her story, for everyone who couldn’t. Now, at 98, this remarkable woman—and TikTok sensation, thanks to the help of her 18-year-old great-grandson—fulfills that vow, relaying the details of her harrowing experiences with candor, charm, and an overflowing heart.

As the Nazis’ relentless bombs fall during the Blitz of Coventry, six-year-old Rose Sherbourne finds herself orphaned and under the guardianship of a Cornish farmer's daughter, Elenor Cardew. Elenor knows that the only way to protect spirited Rose is to leave the city and make a new life for themselves away from harm. But soon Elenor discovers that Hitler’s firestorm is not the only thing she must fear when she learns a devastating secret about Rose....

Six strangers with one universal thing in common: their lives aren’t always what they make them out to be. But what would happen if they told the truth instead? Julian begins The Authenticity Project - a small green notebook containing his ‘truth’ - to pass on and encourage others to share their own. Little does he know that this small act of honesty will impact all those who come into contact with the book and lead to a life-changing world of friendship and forgiveness.... 

Can their friendship survive the darkest days of war? When Abigail arrives for a new start in Bristol in the late 1930s, she knows life won’t be easy - particularly as she is the unmarried mother of three-year-old Emily Grace. But as the war starts to take over the city and threaten their very existence, will Abigail’s new friends, Carrie and Eileen, be enough to keep herself and her daughter safe? 

"There is a fish on the sand; I see it clearly. But it is not on its side, lying still. It is partly upright. It moves. I can see its gills, off the ground and wide open. It looks as though it’s standing up." A few decades into the twenty-first century, in their permanently flooded garden in Cornwall, Cathy and her wife Ephie give up on their vegetable patch and plant a rice paddy instead. Thousands of miles away, ex-pat Margaret is struggling to adjust to life in Kuala Lumpur, now a coastal city. In New Zealand, two teenagers marvel at the extreme storms hitting their island.

A young bride leaves a sleepy town with the man she loves, but within months, he is torn from her life. Returning home, the house is the same, but her whole world has changed. Determined to rise above all that has happened, she accepts a job to sell a huge white elephant located on a forbidding moor. Alone at the vast property, she meets a traveler whose roguish charm hides the truth of what really lies within the former Victorian workhouse. Not realizing the risk she is taking, she tracks down an entrepreneur with a worldwide reputation who is attracted by her business proposal.

Angelina Green never knew her mother, who left her in a cardboard box by the East London docks on a freezing November night when she was a tiny baby. Saved by a local orphanage, she knows she owes her life to the kindness of others. And she’s determined to repay her debt by working as a nurse. Strong, kind and patient, Angelina is a natural on the ward. But when war breaks out in 1914 and she is sent to The Front, her courage is tested like never before....

All the neighbours were laughing, drinking out of plastic glasses and getting along. I almost felt happy. Almost forgot about the terrible argument earlier and the sinister messages I’d been receiving from a strange address all week, threatening to expose the lies behind my perfect life. As we finished with the red and gold fireworks and welcomed everyone back to our house, I believed that everything would be okay. But I didn’t know who I was inviting in.

Jo was the last person to see Martha Scott alive. She was helping Martha unlock a repressed memory. But during the session, Jo unlocked more than she bargained for. An alter personality introduced himself as the reincarnation of Jack the Ripper - and thanked Jo for setting him free to kill again. As Ferguson’s team race to find Martha’s killer, a series of copycat killings begin, replicating ‘The Autumn of Terror’ in 1888. But if Jack is just a figment of Martha’s damaged mind, who killed her? 

Beginning with her solitary childhood in London, it took years for Melanie Phillips to understand her parents' emotional frailties and even longer to escape from them. But Phillips inherited her family's strong Jewish values and a passionate commitment to freedom from oppression. It was this moral foundation that ultimately turned her against the warped and tyrannical attitudes of the Left, requiring her to break away not only from her parents - but also from the people she had seen as her wider political family. 

Unconscious bias affects us all. From the smallest assumption to the most sweeping generalization, the way we think about others can unknowingly influence our behaviour and shape our culture. Acting as your mentor and guide, this book will take you through the most common forms of prejudice, including gender, race, size, age and sexuality. It also explores the psychology behind our biases and provides actionable tips and simple exercises to help you combat implicit judgements.

The legal speed limit for vehicles traveling along the Old Military Road was 60 miles an hour, and he was breaking it. If a car rounded a corner in the opposite direction, it would end up in a ditch, because this driver was not in the mood to slow down for anyone. The sound of cannon fire blasted from his top pocket, and he reached for his phone. He took his eyes off the road to read the text, grunted, and handed the phone to the person seated beside him. The passenger glanced at the short message, looked up, and saw they were approaching a humpback bridge. "You're going too fast."

London 1958. Twenty-six-year-old Betty Fisher is one of the first to join the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and attend its inaugural meeting, where she meets John Harris. Posted to Berlin towards the end of the war, John has been left traumatised by his experiences in Germany. And, as his initial admiration for Betty shifts into an overwhelming need to protect her, he is plagued by flashbacks and fantasies. John's increasing fragility brings to the surface Betty's own memories. And soon her past, too, begins to unravel...

Enid Elliot Linder was the daughter of a butler and a lady’s maid in service in some of England’s grandest country houses. Evoking the lost world of a childhood ‘below stairs’, Linder’s touching memoir describes how her life changed as Britain headed towards war. After the family moved to a Marylebone tenement, her father sought work in London restaurants whilst battling personal demons. Meanwhile Linder’s aunt was nanny to a high-ranking member of the British Union of Fascists as they grew in influence.  

When Izzie Dean’s beloved nan, Molly Blackshaw, passes away, Izzie returns to the Blackpool bungalow where she grew up, to say good-bye once and for all. When Izzie’s homecoming reunites her with her first love, Justin Swift, every emotion that Izzie has repressed since the day he broke her heart comes rushing to the surface. But then an unexpected discovery changes everything.

Following the death of her mother, Becky begins the sad task of sorting through her empty flat. Starting with the letters piling up on the doormat, she finds an envelope post-marked from Cornwall. In it is a letter that will change her life forever. A desperate plea from her mother's elderly cousin, Olivia, to help save her beloved home. Becky arrives at Chynalls to find the beautiful old house crumbling into the ground and Olivia stuck in hospital with no hope of being discharged until her home is made habitable.

The reason for this book is to make you aware of your spirituality and consciousness. The analogy of currency to our basic life’s capital is a representation of the wealth of our spirit and the height of our consciousness. The book will take you on a journey to explore your belief systems regarding a variety of topics, including trust, gratitude, acknowledgment, relationships, sex, energy and presence. You will find exercises which may assist you in evaluating your personal development and increasing and maintaining your spiritual performance.

When Holocaust survivor Lily Ebert was liberated in 1945, a Jewish American soldier gave her a banknote on which he’d written ‘Good luck and happiness’. And when her great-grandson, Dov, decided to use social media to track down the family of the GI, 96-year-old Lily found herself making headlines round the world. Lily had promised herself that if she survived Auschwitz, she would tell everyone the truth about the camp. Now was her chance.