Vicar's daughter Izzy feels hugely guilty that she's having a very good war. Having learned to fly in a travelling circus before the war, she's now joined the Air Transport Auxiliary as one of their few female pilots and is having the time of her life. The only cloud on the horizon is having to lie to her father about her exact role in the ATA. Her father is against the whole notion of women flying - he certainly wouldn't approve of her becoming a 'spitfire girl'.Izzy also feels di...

Charlie Gavin was abducted as a baby. He didn't know who he was or where he came from. His mission was to find himself. And when he did, he decided to spend his life finding other lost souls by opening the Be Kindly Missing Persons Bureau.Martha Walters, his assistant, has had her fifteen minutes of almost fame and failed. Now, dealing with her guilt and pain, she lives with her mum and dotes on her young daughter. Charlie appears to be a man who is a loser and dreamer, but, hey, h...

In the Scottish fishing village of Mareth, everyone knows everything about each other - and what they don't know they assume; the villagers live against a constantly changing backdrop of elaborate scheming and sexual innuendo. At the hub of this world is the Ocean Cafe, run by tousle-haired, forty-something Magda, who makes grown men eat their greens, won't serve customers she doesn't like, and loves her children and their father with a passion. When Jessie Tate, devastated by recent trage...

Charlie Gavin foi raptado quando era bebé. Algo que ele só descobriu graças a uma surpreendente lata de bolachas. A partir daí, a missão da sua vida passou a ser uma: encontrar-se. E quando o fez, decidiu dedicar-se a encontrar outras almas perdidas e fundou o Gabinete de Pessoas Desaparecidas Com Amabilidade.Martha Walters, a sua assistente, também se encontra em luta com o passado. Ou seja, os quinze minutos de fama que a sua banda - Vinnie and the Vixens - não conseguiu aproveit...

When James McElroy saw the ad for a lodger with 'Bibi Sanders' in a smart Edinburgh street, he pictured a glamorous young landlady with whom he would form a meaningful and deep relationship. But Bibi's in her seventies. She's led a full life, including marriage to the domineering and difficult Callum, now deceased, and raised six children.She's not sure what to make of James and suspects - rightly - a troubling secret in his past. When Bibi sets out to re-visit the past for the final time ...

As a child Nora waged war on her mother, Maisie. It relieved the hurt she felt when she overheard Maisie say she preferred her older daughter, Cathryn. Now, Nora lives in Edinburgh, far from her gaudily decorated suburban London home and the volatile Maisie. She is introduced to a circle of friends who all work in the same publisher's offices. In Brendan, the gentle deputy editor, she finds a friend who shares her deprecating humour, and fascination with trivia, as they chat and walk about...

When Megs became a cleaner, she didn't realise that if people looked at her a cleaner would be all they saw. Megs has as full a life as the people she does for, Mrs Terribly-Clean-Pearson or Ms Oh-Just-Keep-It-Above-The-Dysentery-Line McGhee. She's the mother of three children and still mourning the death of a son; she enjoys a constant sparring match with her mother; she drinks away her troubles with Lorraine, her friend since Primary One; and she sings the blues in a local club. Megs has...

When Roz's silent, compulsive husband refused to discuss his problem, when her children seemed embroiled in their own lives, Roz did the unthinkable - she walked out. She did not know that her children would not understand, would not forgive her. She had one moment of joy, shutting the door, leaving, followed by ten years of guilt. Then the death of the family matriarch Nan reunites Roz, now with a career, a flat and a lover, with her family. Histrionic Zoe and infuriatingly laid-back Jami...

To the neighbours who helped raise her, Madeline was a handful: opinionated, disruptive, verbose. They blamed it all on her lack of a mother. But Madeline was happy: her father was parent enough. Till he wasn't there for her any more, and Madeline had to grow up fast. Befriended by Annie, she catches a glimpse of normal family life, and sees Annie glow as she marries her adoring Willie. Madeline has never wanted a regular man in her own life, yet somehow she finds herself living in a rambl...

Rowan has always cherished an ambition to travel. She didn't just leave the small Scottish town where she grew up; she fled from it as fast as she could. Now she's become expert at metropolitan living; she could walk by a million faces and not notice any of them. And her dream is almost within her grasp.When Rowan does start packing her bags, she has to find room for one very unexpected item. And she's headed not for exotic distant shores but back to Scotland. There, she feels at fi...

A girl, Nell was convinced, should have a good time at seventeen, have met her true love at eighteen, be engaged at nine, and marry at twenty-one.While her mother regards the Locarno Dancehall as a den of iniquity, for seventeen-year-old, shop-girl, Nell McClusky, it's the centre of the universe. Where else is she going to meet the man of her dreams who'll take her away from the hum-drum realities of life on a council estate in 1950s Edinburgh?At first Alistair Rut...

Charlie Gavin was abducted as a baby. He didn't know who he was or where he came from. His mission was to find himself. And when he did, he decided to spend his life finding other lost souls by opening the Be Kindly Missing Persons Bureau. Martha Walters, his assistant, has had her 15 minutes of almost fame and failed. Now, dealing with her guilt and pain, she lives with her mum and dotes on her young daughter. Charlie appears to be a dreamer, but, hey, his office is near her house, she ca...