Anna Jacobs has 69 audiobooks on Listento.it, narrated by 17 narrators, with an average listener rating of 4.7★ across 69 ratings. The most-rated is Aveoth.
A Time to Remember
Summary
The first book in a heartwarming new Lancashire-based series by beloved and best-selling saga writer Anna Jacobs, set at the end of World War Two. 1945 - the war in Europe is over. It should be a time of utter joy and celebration. Most women can't wait for their men to return, but in the small town of Rivenshaw in Lancashire, Judith Crossley fears having her husband back in the house. He'd grown into a bully and a drunkard, and on the occasions he'd come home from leave, he'd hit her. He wasn't a good father, either. Luckily Judith has found an unlikely ally, a friend to turn to - Maynard Esher, from an old aristocratic family on the other side of town. But Judith knows that when her husband returns, she and her children will be back in the firing line again. She decides that for the children's sake, she must leave her husband. But with the house rented in his name and other accommodation scarce, where on earth can they go?
©2019 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Limited
Yesterday's Girl
Summary
The Great War opened up an exciting new career for Vi in London. But that was yesterday. Now the war's over, her husband is dead and she needs to pick up the pieces of her life.
On her way home from work she meets a man who is in huge need of her help. Recently demobbed, Joss Bentley has no job or home and, with his wife dead, there's a new baby to care for - and, what's more, it's not his. As he searches grimly for its real father, he runs up against people who will use any means necessary to conceal dark secrets, and Vi finds herself faced with conflicting loyalties. Whichever way she moves, it seems she'll hurt someone - or they'll hurt her....
©2008 Anna Jacobs (P)2008 Isis Publishing Ltd
A Stranger in Honeyfield
Summary
1916. Bella is working as a Voluntary Aid driving ambulances in England when she gets engaged to Philip, on leave from fighting in France. His family strongly disapprove of her, but the two of them are happy together. Georgie, Philip's sister, is in trouble, having broken her engagement and fled from her bullying family. Who can she turn to for help when she needs it most? When the worst happens, Bella must manage on her own, though there are shocks and dangers ahead that she did not foresee. Thankfully, Philip's best friend, Tez, injured in France, steps in to offer assistance. Can he also help Bella build a new life?
©2017 Anna Jacobs (P)2017 Soundings
Finding Cassie
Summary
When the teenage girl who's been hanging around near the house knocks on the door and tells her she's her granddaughter, Cassie is shocked rigid. There's only one way this can be true: if Evie is the daughter of the baby Cassie gave away for adoption when she was herself a troubled teenager. Is this a trick? Or is Evie's tale true? When she finds out why the girl has come to find her, it brings a tangle of other problems that she can't ignore. This was the last thing she expected to be dealing with as she moves into her new home in a leisure village in Wiltshire.
©2020 Anna Jacobs (P)2020 Soundings
Our Mary Ann
Summary
The final installment in the breathtaking Kershaw Sisters series. She thought the worst was behind her.... Life is tough in Lancashire in 1905 - and especially so for 15-year-old Mary Ann, who was born out of wedlock. When her new stepfather begins to abuse her, Mary Ann doesn't know how much more she can take - until the worst happens and she is sent away to bear his child. After the birth, she manages to escape to Blackpool with the help of her new friend Gabriel. Years later, the Great War brings Mary Ann many new opportunities, and brings Gabriel back into her life - but circumstances mean they can never be together. When her mother dies, Mary Ann decides it's finally time to return to Lancashire and uncover the secrets of her past. But an unknown danger threatens both her and the child she thought she'd lost forever.... Will history repeat itself - or will Mary Ann's courage win her the happiness she deserves?
©2019 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
A Widow's Courage
Summary
Lancashire 1934. Three years after her husband's sudden death, Stella comes into some money unexpectedly and decides to make a new start in the country. She settles on Ellin Valley, where she quickly begins to make friends. She falls in love with a cottage in Birch End, but an unscrupulous man wants it too. Will she be able to buy her dream home? Life has changed drastically for local handyman Wilf Pollard as well. When tragedy strikes, Wilf is left as the only support of his two young children. But his friends rally round to help so that he can pull his life together and take up an exciting new job with a well-respected builder. Some of the local council are eager to deal with the squalid conditions of the Backshaw Moss slum, but others will stop at nothing to keep their profitable rents. And Stella's dream cottage is threatened by their plans to build yet more cheap housing. Can Stella, Wilf and the residents of Birch End pull together to make sure good triumphs over evil?
©2020 Anna Jacobs (P)2020 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Our Polly
Summary
The second installment in the breathtaking Kershaw Sisters series. There is no love like a mother's for her child.... Little Billy, Polly's son, is the light of her life. It's for his sake that she puts up with an unkind mother-in-law and life on an isolated farm. When Billy is knocked down by a car, his father is killed attempting to save his life, and Polly, cast off by her husband's family, is left with a child who may never walk or talk again. Polly turns to her own family, the Kershaws, for support, but they are unable to outmanoeuvre the malicious Dr Browning-Baker, who is determined to have Billy taken away from his mother, depriving him of the exercises and stimulation that are his only hope. Forced to flee to the Fylde coast, Polly and Billy find that their future may lie with another damaged family - an ex-army captain whose First World War marriage was a terrible mistake, and his daughter, who has never recovered from the hostility of the mother she loves. But danger threatens their fragile happiness....
©2019 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
A Time to Rejoice
Summary
The heartwarming third instalment of the Rivenshaw series from best-selling saga writer Anna Jacobs. After a stray bomb scored a direct hit on his childhood home in Hertfordshire, the only thing that has kept Francis Brady going while he works day and night salvaging what he can from the rubble is the thought that soon he'll be joining wartime friends Mayne, Daniel and Victor as electrician in their new dream building firm in Lancashire. But things are not going to plan: Mayne isn't answering any of his letters; Francis' wife is having a change of heart about moving up north - and her parents seem set on destroying his reputation.... A lot of marriages are breaking up in these times of change, and Francis is loathe for his to be one of them.... But how can he turn down the opportunity of a new life and career in Rivenshaw? Meanwhile in Rivenshaw itself, newly married Mayne and Judith's plans to convert Esherwood house into flats have come to an abrupt halt. While clearing out the house in readiness for the rebuild, they've discovered that someone has been stealing valuables and hiding them in the old Nissen hut. But who hid them there - and are they planning on returning for them? And are they also responsible for something else found in the shelter: a body, buried in a shallow grave.... With so much going against them, can these four friends ever turn their dreams into reality?
©2019 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Beyond the Sunset
Summary
Set in Lancashire and Western Australia in the 1860s, Anna Jacobs' entrancing new saga follows the fortunes of the family that first appeared in Farewell to Lancashire. In the untamed outback of Western Australia, the Blake sisters are together again despite what seemed like unsurmountable odds. For Cassandra - reunited again with the man she loves - the Swan River Colony is a refuge that seems like a miracle after all her ordeals. And two of her sisters have fallen in love with their new way of life. But then a messenger arrives from faraway England, and it is the fourth sister, Pandora, who jumps at the chance to make her way back to the Lancashire moors that she misses so badly. The way home, though, will be even harder than the voyage to Australia. The only ship that can take her and her new protector back to England lies many days' journey away, across country that would daunt even a hardened explorer. And when she reaches Outham, a devious, dangerous enemy will do anything to prevent her from taking charge of her family's inheritance....
©2019 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Hallam Square
Summary
The fourth novel in the Lancashire-based Gibson series by beloved saga writer Anna Jacobs. In 1858 Annie Hallam has at last found complete happiness. She has three healthy babies and adores her husband, Frederick. After years of struggling to make a living in the small Lancashire town of Bilsden, Annie knows she deserves to sit back and enjoy her life - after all, she's not yet 40, and still in her prime. But worries - at first faint clouds on the horizon - are imminent. Frederick has been looking pale and ill lately. Her brother Tom hasn't moved on after the death of his wife. Rebecca, her half sister, is longing for something more than her work in the salon. And William, her son, isn't happy at university. In spite of Frederick's gentle urging not to take the entire burden of the Gibson family on her shoulders, Annie can't help feeling concerned. And something much more dangerous is looming - a threat not only to Annie's peace of mind but to her life....
©1996 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Limited
Legacy of Greyladies
Summary
Olivia Hanbury is widowed in the middle of WWI and reluctantly goes back to live with her parents. In the village the Vicar's wife is trying to set up a women's institute. Olivia helps her, and for the first time since her husband's death she feels useful. However, her family decide the Vicar's wife is giving her foolish ideas, so they forbid her to help any more. Instead Olivia runs away to become one of the paid organisers who is helping set up local women's institutes in Wiltshire. Her work brings her to Greyladies, where she meets Phoebe. Will she manage to make a life for herself, or will her family and those who don't approve of the WI stop her?
©2015 Anna Jacobs (P)2015 Soundings
Saffron Lane
Summary
Nell has come to feel very at home in her beautiful corner of Wiltshire with her partner, Angus. What she could do with, however, is a challenge, and the prospect of bringing life back to an abandoned row of houses, Saffron Lane, is just what she’s looking for. Stacy, lost and alone after a divorce she didn’t see coming, is trying her best to start over. And Elise, battling her nieces who would force her into residential care, longs for a home where she can get back to her painting. When their paths cross, the future starts to look brighter - although not all goes according to plan.
©2017 Anna Jacobs (P)2018 Soundings
Elm Tree Road
Summary
After being driven from home by their brutal father, the Willett sisters find themselves facing greater heartache in the wider world. Nell, the middle daughter, has left home to be with her lover, Cliff, fearing what reprisals might come from marrying against her father’s wishes. The couple head for Lancashire, but Nell’s happiness is short-lived. A gypsy palm-reader tells her she will still find her destiny, under ‘three big trees on a hill’ and her luck does seem to change when she meets Gil, and farmer and a gentleman who she can’t help but feel drawn to. Could the trees on his land be a sign, or will Nell be too damaged by her past to let herself love again?
©2011 Anna Jacobs (P)2011 Soundings
Tomorrow's Promises
Summary
Ellen Dawson is glad when the Great War ends but sad that Lady Bingram's aides are to be disbanded. She can't bear to go back into service again after working as a driver and mechanic in London. But she is forced by her mother's illness to accept her old position as housemaid in order to stay in the small Lancashire town, and her stepfather will stop at nothing to get her under his control again. Meanwhile, Seth Talbot is also facing difficulties when he takes over as local policeman in a town where the law has been flouted for years....
©2007 Anna Jacobs (P)2007 Isis Publishing Ltd
Farewell to Lancashire
Summary
Saga storytelling at its finest for all Catherine Cookson fans. Cassandra Blake has raised her three motherless sisters. The girls are the pride of their book-loving, impractical father, and not in a hurry to marry. Then the American Civil War cuts off supplies of cotton to Lancashire, the mills fall silent and there is no work. There is a stark choice: stay and risk starvation or pack up and begin again elsewhere. Cassandra has fallen in love with Reece Gregory, but he can't support a wife. When he's given the chance to start a new life in Western Australia, he seizes the opportunity, promising to send for her. Then an old feud tears the family apart. Cassandra is kidnapped and her sisters are forced to sail with a group of desperate cotton lasses to Fremantle. Penniless and alone, Cassandra is determined to find them again - but when she is offered a way, there is a painful price to pay.
©2019 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Le destin de Cassandra
Summary
1861. Le Lancashire subit la crise. Privées de coton, les filatures ferment une à une en Angleterre, plongeant la population dans la misère. Cassandra Blake, ses trois sœurs cadettes et leur père Edwin tentent malgré tout de faire face à l'adversité. Mais la mort du patriarche vient tout bouleverser. Leur oncle Joseph décide de prendre ses nièces sous son aile, malgré l'opposition de son acariâtre épouse, qui commandite en secret l'enlèvement de Cassandra. Elle menace alors ses sœurs de faire subir à la jeune femme les pires sévices si elles ne quittent pas le pays... Contraintes de dire adieu à leur Lancashire natal, elles embarquent pour l'Australie. Les quatre sœurs parviendront- elles à se retrouver à l'autre bout du monde, et à construire une vie nouvelle ? Une saga au souffle puissant, qui nous entraîne dans une Australie encore sauvage, ou tous les rêves sont permis.
©2018 L'Archipel (P)2020 Audible Studios
High Street
Summary
The second in the heartwarming Lancashire saga series that began with Salem Street, by beloved author Anna Jacobs. In 1845 Annie Gibson can finally leave Salem Street. Her dreams of being able to open an elegant dressmaking salon in the High Street of Bilsden, a Lancashire mill town, have come true. And she is going to take her father and his second family with her, away from poverty, away from the Rows. But Annie has not left trouble behind. Someone is trying to undermine her business. Her family have their own ideas about what they want to do with their lives. And several men are persistently trying to win favour with the beautiful young widow - including Frederick Hallam, the mill owner, and Daniel O'Connor, her childhood friend. As Annie gets better acquainted with both, she becomes increasingly confused about her feelings. Can she really be in love. And can she risk trusting any man again.
©1994 Anna Jacobs (P)2021 Hodder & Stoughton Limited
A Daughter's Journey
Summary
Book one in beloved author Anna Jacobs' brand-new Birch End series. Jo Melling has arrived in Birch End from Australia, still grieving her father's recent death. She's not intending to stay long, but after tracking down her distant family, Jo becomes more involved in village life than she could ever have imagined - and suddenly in danger, too. Jo also finds herself drawn to Nick, a handsome newcomer to the village. Nick had planned to settle in Birch End and start a business, but as he grows closer to Jo, he realises he may have to choose between his dreams and a chance at love. Meanwhile, the new local council are faced with some tough decisions of their own. It's time to take a stand against the poor conditions in Backshaw Moss, the nearby slum, but some councillors want things to stay as they are - and will go to any lengths to make sure they get their way.... Will the decent people of the valley win a brighter future for themselves? And can Jo find a way to stay with Nick in a place she's grown to love?
©2019 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Our Lizzie
Summary
The first installment in the breathtaking Kershaw Sisters series.
They say you only regret the things you don't do....
Lizzie Kershaw is an independent spirit; ever since her father's death she has had to be a survivor. Home life is harsh, though, and desperate to escape it, she makes an ill-advised marriage. But she discovers all too quickly that she's married a selfish and violent man. His beatings never seem to stop, and she soon comes to a decision: she must run far, far away.
With the help of some suffragettes she escapes to Manchester, where she finds work in a munitions factory - she is finally the independent woman she has always longed to be. But her husband, whose cruelty knows no bounds, tracks her down and drags her back home to more beatings than ever.
But when his violence causes her to lose the one thing she's always wanted, Lizzie knows she must find the strength to make the changes in her life that are so sorely needed.
©2019 Anna Jacobs (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Heart of the Town
Summary
Dora Preston has guts, but it will take more than that for her to break free from Hedderby and make a life for herself on the stage. Then she meets Gideon - and pursuing her ambitions becomes even harder. Gideon has returned from the fighting in India only to discover that an impostor has stolen his inheritance. He has vowed he will claim his birthright, but his enemies are ruthless and desperate. Arson attacks, crime and drunkenness have beset the Lancashire mill town, but the forces of goodness are rallying and are determined to prevail, whatever it takes.
©2006 Anna Jacobs (P)2007 Isis Publishing Ltd.