20th Century

Four people's lives are dramatically torn apart by a single terrifying event. Two days before Christmas the express train to Strasbourg crashes into a local train in the winter darkness outside Paris. On board is Gilles Malroux, a man with a shady past and a strong reason to avoid the police. In the mayhem of the crash he is badly injured but to avoid capture by the police he swaps identity papers with one of the other victims of the impact. Gilles tries to flee in the dark but finds himself taken to the house of a woman he doesn't know but who calls him Davide.

It is 1929. The world is about to change. Finn Evans is a successful Boston banker harboring a secret that threatens to unravel his carefully constructed idyllic life. Isabelle Lazar, a young Ukrainian farmer, endures unspeakable hardships in her homeland as she fights to save her family from the Soviet Union's iron grip. Barely escaping the Terror-Famine, she washes up alone on America's distant shores. Fate throws Finn and Isabelle together just as the stock market crash causes a devastating collapse of his world.

From acclaimed authors Aimie K. Runyan, J'nell Ciesielski, and Rachel McMillan comes an evocative, three-part novel about a thread of connection during World War I--a single scarf that links three extraordinary women, each battling societal expectations, enduring the devastations of war, and striving for personal growth amidst the chaos.

For as long as Alice Carmichael can remember, the only thing she’s been able to count on is the written word. The war may have taken everything from her, but the stories she cherishes provide solace and escape into a world that is more hopeful than 1942 England. So when Alice finds herself at the mercy and kindness of strangers, miles from everything she’s ever known, it’s little surprise that books become her purpose. Now, Alice must channel the courage of her favourite heroines to risk everything for her country.

After a whirlwind romance, usherette Connie is swept off her feet when projectionist Charlie proposes in a film reel added to the final frames of Casablanca. Her job at the Tivoli cinema in Tiverton has been a refuge from her violent and alcoholic father, Frank. But that night, Connie disappears, not only from Charlie's life, but from her own as well.

Fifteen-year-old Kate lives a rarefied life of wealth and privilege in the pre-war Hong Kong expatriate community, but when the Japanese invade she’s interned in squalid Stanley Camp with her parents. Enduring cramped conditions, humiliation, disease, and starvation, Kate befriends seventeen-year-old Charles, who is half Chinese, and they give their hearts to each other under the orchid tree. Meanwhile, forty miles away in Portuguese Macau, thirteen-year-old Sofia’s suspicions are aroused when her father invites a Japanese family to dinner.

Two Necklaces is the story of a German girl's coming of age who dares to think for herself at a time when that very act was dangerous, even life-threatening. It delves into the very nature of the human condition with its frailty, strength, and the struggle of mind and heart.

Helen, a war bride from England, journeys with her infant son to an unfamiliar continent on the hope of a promise - a promise that is, at times, hard to hold on to. While Canadian citizens face their private battles at home, Helen determinedly perseveres as wife to a suffering veteran and mother to their son. Her resolve to fight for her family and make the vast, distant prairies her new homeland reveals the strength and power of a war bride’s heart.

In this fifth book of the epic Barton Family Series, Hattie Barton finally marries her first love, Will Kendrick, and is set to travel with him to Shanghai where he’d served as a missionary after their broken engagement thirty years earlier. A family crisis interrupts their plans and Will is forced to go alone to Shanghai. He is detained when the US enters World War II after the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941.

For the first time in her adult life, Nicole Tate is without a job after being "let go" from her position as a fifth-grade teacher. She suddenly finds herself alone in Chicago with no real friends, no family, no job, and no love life. Wanting to tear up the town after being a quiet teacher for months, she heads to the local club where sex, drugs, and disco reign. There, she meets Dex Holden, owner of the hottest dance studio and school in the city, and he also happens to be the hottest man Nicole has ever seen.