Showing results by narrator "Lesley Mackie" in All Categories

Emma Greig has seen little of the world when she leaves school to become a maid at Bonnybrae Farm. The Sinclair family in turn welcome and reject her: Maggie is kind and warm, and the two girls quickly become close. Her brothers Jim and William are more playful, gently teasing Emma for her youthful innocence. The haughty and aloof Mrs Sinclair, disturbed by her children's friendships with the new maid, resolves to remind Emma of her place on the social divide.

It was September 1962, and the building of the New Forth Road Bridge was bringing excitement to the small community of North Queensferry. For Nancy and Joe Mackay, it’s a time of change in their family, with Nancy’s new job and Joe’s work on the ferries under threat. Lorna, their daughter, is acting very secretively, much to the annoyance of her father. Their eldest son Matt is working on the new bridge as a welder, his safety constantly fretted over by his mother.

1919. Miss Rina Capel, granddaughter of the Laird of Stavondale, has one ambition - to set aside her life of privilege and become a nurse. But when she is summoned back to Bonnybrae to see her dying grandfather just before her 18th birthday, he reveals to her family secrets which turn her world upside down. In love with a man she can't have, and facing marriage to a man she has never met, Rina must draw on all her reserves of strength and female guile to escape a fate to which her dissolute parents would condemn her.

1895. With five children as well as her husband Sandy to care for, Katy Fraser’s life is always fully occupied. Yet, Katy longs for something else. And when the new minister moves into the manse he agrees to take her on as a housekeeper. Soon she is given a rare opportunity to fulfil her dreams, but Sandy begins to resent her new-found confidence... Eight years later, Katy and Sandy’s brood are fast growing up.

When sisters Lynette and Monnie accompany their father, Edinburgh widower Frank Forester, to the Highland village where he is to be a youth hostel warden, they find the change from city life traumatic…until they find jobs, new friends – and love. Handsome fisherman Torquil captures Monnie's heart, while Lynette, after a fiery start, falls for stern but vulnerable hotel manager Ronan. When Frank, too, finds unexpected happiness with Ishbel, of the village shop, all promises well. But storm clouds gather, and there are choices to be made…

Kilt maker Kirsty Muir finds life hard in 1960s Edinburgh, where money is tight and excitement hard to find. When a charming Scottish fiddler, Jack MacIver, comes into her life and introduces her to a glamorous new world, it seems she has finally found her way out. But Kirsty is left broken-hearted, when he disappears off on tour. Her heart is mended by Andrew Macrae, owner of the kilt shop, and it seems as though Kirsty will find happiness after all.

Alfie McCreadie wants his twin sister, Nessa, to have the best wedding ever, but he’s not happy at being roped in as wedding planner - especially as, unbelievably, his main assistant seems to be Nessa’s cat, Schubert. Anyway, Alfie is a scientist. He might know his protons from his neutrons, but what does he know about weddings? It’s Nessa who points him in the direction of Bea’s Garden. It’s there he meets Fae Brimham, who might be prettier than any bouquet bloom but doesn’t seem impressed by Alfie’s sensible, scientific side.

After the Second World War, Ellen and her daughter Netta make the journey from Germany back to Scotland. Nestled in the hills of the Southern Uplands is the farm where Ellen grew up – the home she left to be with the only man she's ever loved. She is still haunted by her memories...and the secrets she dare not share with anyone. Having grown up in Freiburg, farm life is new and exciting to Netta. Determined to be useful, she offers to help new shepherd Andrew Cameron. But doing so might put her bruised heart at risk....

Feisty, hardworking Catherine McDonald knows what's best for everyone and tries to make it happen. To keep her aristocratic family's heads above water, she's turned their Scottish Highland home, Annat House, into a hotel, but it's a struggle. And things don't improve when a woman goes missing in the nearby mountains and the media moves in.

It's 1925. Attractive and strong-willed 23-year-old Isla Scott leaves her job as a nurse in Edinburgh to return to her hometown of Edgemuir and take up a vacancy at Dr Lorne's fashionable spa, where she is reunited with her handsome brother, Boyd. Revelling in her new role and being close to Boyd, all seems well for Isla and the Scott family. But the siblings soon find that romance threatens to cloud their future. Boyd is bowled over by pretty new waitress Trina Morris, but is she playing games with his affections?

While her mother is at home giving birth, 11-year-old Isa must look after her younger siblings, but when her little sister is killed in an accident on a train line she carries the guilt through the rest of her life. As Isa grows up, more tragedy strikes. Yet there is only so much Isa can endure over the years, and discovering her husband’s affair is the final straw. Believing she has failed as a sister, a daughter, a wife and a mother, she makes an irrevocable decision....

Growing up on a farm in the north of Scotland could be both rewarding and challenging. Now best-selling author Jane Yeadon recounts her childhood before her nursing adventures started, in her own unique and entertaining style. Telling Tales recounts how Jane learned about her place in the scheme of things - the hard way. Poignant and touching, this nostalgic account of life on the farm recalls a way of life which was so recent but now is all but forgotten.

In 1939, the unexpected death of Sandra Anderson dramatically and ruthlessly changes forever the lives of the family she leaves behind. Kitty, her spoiled and pampered 15-year-old daughter, has to give up her dreams of a career as she becomes the family drudge. Sandra's heartbroken husband, Johnny, finds solace for his grief by becoming the main mouthpiece for his trade union in the shipyards, leaving little time for newborn Rosebud, whose birth caused her mother's death.

Janet Scott loves books and learning and is happy living at the schoolhouse where her grandfather is the dominie. When her grandfather dies suddenly, everything changes, and she is sent to work for farmer Wull Foster. Life with no one to protect her is tough. So when philanthropist Josiah Saunders, an old friend of her grandfather's, takes her in, they both relish the companionship.

In 1960s Scotland, the farming industry is on the brink of huge changes, becoming more mechanised and less dependent on manpower, but at Lochandee it’s a time of hope and promise. Ross and Rachel Maxwell are proud of their expanding family. Daughter Bridie and her Nick are happily married and working hard to build up their own farm, and eldest son Conan’s transport business is prospering.

In the years following the end of World War II, life at the Glens of Lochandee is tough. Many families in the village have been bereaved, and rationing is affecting business. Nevertheless, Conan Maxwell’s new garage is doing well, and he and business partner Nick are hoping to expand. But how will their partnership survive their differing ambitions? Conan’s young sister, Bridie, is faced with a dilemma. Is her desire for Nick going to pull her away from her other great passion - her animals and farm?

At 16, Rachel O’Brian finds herself alone in the world and accepts a home with an old friend of her father’s, but she is unprepared for his wife’s malice. The younger Maxwells welcome Rachel to their Ayrshire farm, especially Ross, but he too has earned Gertrude Maxwell’s spite. When Ross disappears Rachel is dismayed to find herself destitute and expecting his child. How will past secrets revealed help the two find each other again?

1949. Attractive and spirited Roz Rainey, who lives in post-war Edinburgh with her widowed mother, her sister, Chrissie, and brother, Douglas, enjoys working in a lawyer’s property office where she dreams, not of love, but of one day having a beautiful house of her own. After all, why shouldn’t she be ambitious? Then the unexpected happens when she falls in love with her new boss, the charming Jamie Shield. Full of happiness, it seems as though a blissful future beckons for Roz. Fate, however, has other ideas…

. She is content there until, suddenly, she must make decisions that will change everything. Fraser Kyle, the owner of the florist’s, proposes marriage. Should she accept, or renew her childish love for Mark Lindsay the doctor from the orphanage who first showed Shona the Handkerchief Tree that inspired her?

Jess Raeburn lives with her widowed mother and beautiful sister in a small flat in Leith. Though reasonably content in her job in a department store, Jess dreams of a more exciting life.