Showing results by author "Kate Hewitt" in All Categories

After years of survival and devastating loss, the promise of a new settlement in North Dakota feels like salvation. A chance for my children to reclaim some semblance of normalcy, studying and making friends again, and for me to find new purpose, reporting on this strange new world we’re living in for a newspaper. I’m even forming new friendships as I grow closer to Jack Norman, the settlement’s deputy leader.

1938, Salzburg. Johanna, Birgit, and Lotte Eder have always lived quiet lives, working in their father’s clockmaking shop and helping their mother in the house. But like many other Austrians, they find it impossible to ignore the changes in the world around them. At first Johanna finds it hard to believe the Nazis pose a real threat. But then her father hires Franz to help in his shop. He’s kind and soulful, with dark eyes that twinkle with intelligence. But he’s Jewish, and as Johanna falls for him, she realizes that loving him puts them all in danger.

As I stare at the ultrasound, my eyes fill with tears. My husband squeezes my hand, thinking they are tears of happiness. How do I tell him they aren’t? When I meet the love of my life, Mark, I have everything I ever dreamed of. Our lives are perfect, until we find out I can’t give him the one thing he truly wants—a child. There is a small glimmer of hope. We could use a surrogate. But as the doctor explains that we can’t use my eggs, my heart breaks all over again.

As I hold my daughter’s newborn baby to my chest, my heart breaks knowing she didn’t live to meet her son. Someone will need to raise this child, but who will fight the hardest?

Seven months ago, our family left suburban Connecticut for my parents’ isolated lake house in a naïve attempt to reconnect. Life had imploded, or so I thought then. I hoped the change would reset us: a montage of Hallmark moments—card games in candlelight, spontaneous hugs and important, healing chats. What I got was a nuclear holocaust five days after we arrived. A week ago, the lake house burned to the ground. Our last place of safety. Now, I watch my children huddle together, their faces lit up by our tiny campfire beneath the towering blackness of endless pine forests. 

Anna Vere has escaped to the Cotswolds for Christmas to try to heal from her broken engagement and, far worse, her broken dreams. When her reserved room at a bed-and-breakfast is flooded, she takes up the offer of camping out in Willoughby Close, the converted stables of the nearby manor house...and is taken under the wing of sexy local carpenter Colin Heath. What starts out as merely helping a neighbor in need turns into far more as Colin and Anna share a surprisingly intense and emotional connection, weaving their own Christmas magic as they spend the holiday together.

Persephone is the youngest Penryn, and she’s always felt like an afterthought. As her siblings ventured out one by one, she was left behind, learning to rely on herself. Now that they’ve all returned and are on a mission to save their home, she’s reluctantly falling in with their plans and keeping her distance, especially when an Oxford-educated intern arrives wanting to learn how to save one’s ancestral home.

Twelve years ago when her daughters were mostly grown, Anna walked away from Embthwaite Farm with no plan except to preserve her sanity and to find a ray of light to cling to. But going home is harder than even Anna imagines. Her daughters are miles away from forgiveness and rebuff her every overture of help and communication, and her ex, who knows why she left, doesn't even want to speak to her. But Anna's determined to face her demons, make amends, and reconnect with her family.

With older sister Rachel home to help run the family farm and navigate their father's terminal illness, Harriet Mowbray feels untethered, yet surprisingly free. She wants to embrace her future but continually trips over the insecurities and hurts from her fraught family relationships. When a mysterious millionaire purchases a derelict manor home to renovate into a hotel set to open before Christmas, Harriet pushes herself out of her comfort zone. She approaches the owner to become a client for her fledging bakery business.

Alice James has been a drifter her whole life, working her way through several foster homes before ending up in Wychwood-on-Lea, feeling anchorless and invisible. When a chance encounter leads to Alice accepting a position as a caretaker and companion to Lady Stokeley, she starts to feel as if she might finally be able to put down some roots and live the way other people do. Then, Lady Stokeley’s nephew, city banker Henry Trent, storms into Willoughby Manor, seeming to find fault with everything, including Alice.

It’s a warm, early summer’s evening, when Mia’s doorbell rings unexpectedly. She opens the door to see the silhouette of a teenage girl, standing in the shadow beyond the porch light - and in an instant, she realizes who it is. Daisy, the daughter she gave up as a baby. She says she has a terrible secret. And she believes the only person who can help her is Mia. Her birth mother. Mia, however, has secrets of her own. Ones that she is afraid to let Daisy or anyone else know.

When Tessa arrives at the little house by the lake with her two children, it is an escape. The rental house may be a bit small – but it’s theirs for the summer. A place to hide.... However, their isolation is disrupted by the family from the big house next door. Three children and their glamorous mother Rebecca – who seems determined to invite Tessa into their lives.

Belinda "Lindy" Jamison has moved to the Cotswolds for a fresh start and to open a dancing school - her lifelong dream. Pushing 40 and still looking for Mr. Right, Lindy is determined to no longer wait for happiness but to reach for it with both hands. Soon Lindy has a motley crew of would-be dancers. But her most intriguing pupil is Roger Wentworth, a 40-something bachelor with a shy and awkward manner, but a heart of blazing gold.

In the middle of our school’s bustling summer picnic, I watch Harriet walk purposefully toward my husband, Michael. She places her hand on his arm, introducing herself and laughing at something he says. A knot forms in my stomach as I watch them. We’ve been here before. But I can’t just walk away....

1944, London. When Lily meets enigmatic GI Matthew in war-torn London, she doesn’t expect to fall in love. While her sister starts a reckless affair with another GI, Lily tries to hide her growing feelings for Matthew. But Matthew has a devastating secret. One that could change their lives forever.

Nathan West loved his wife Laura with all his heart. But now she’s gone, taken from him in a seemingly random act of violence. Laura was the glue that held their family together. And for Nathan, life without her feels almost meaningless. As he tries to find hope in the darkness, his three young daughters express their grief in different and challenging ways - with one set on a path of self-destruction that could devastate their family all over again.

Single mother Beth loves her seven-year-old son Dylan with all her heart. He’s her world. But life with Dylan isn’t easy — and his emotional issues push Beth to her very limit. When a misunderstanding leads Dylan to be taken into foster care, she is determined to do whatever she can to get him back. Mother of two, Ally has always dreamed of fostering — it feels like her chance to give back when she has been so lucky in life. But when Dylan joins their family, Ally finds herself struggling to balance his needs with those of her own children and husband.

The year 1819, Isle of Mull, Scotland: When Allan MacDougall tells his sweetheart, Harriet Campbell, he loves her on the eve of his departure to the New World, it breaks her heart. Because there is no way for her to go with him. She promises to wait for him, even though it could be years before they are reunited. They vow to write, but when crucial letters go astray, they feel further apart than either could have imagined.

Rachel’s worst nightmare comes true when a rare auto-immune illness leaves 4-year-old daughter Emily in a coma the doctors say she may never come out of. And Rachel has to make a heartbreaking decision - one that her ex-husband, Emily’s dad James, doesn’t agree with. Terrified she’s going to lose her daughter for good, Rachel knows she must find a way to keep the hope alive for Emily. But there is only one person she can turn to for help to convince James - and it’s his new wife, Eva.

Berlin, 1936: From her beautiful new home Liesel Scholz barely notices the changes to the city around her. Her life is one of privilege and safety thanks to her father’s job working for the new government. But soon a chance encounter with Rosa, the daughter of their Jewish housekeeper, leaves Liesel in no doubt that something isn’t right. Frankfurt, 1946: An idealistic American captain, Sam Houghton, arrives in Germany to interrogate prominent Nazis on trial and to help rebuild a battered country. He hires an enigmatic and damaged woman named Anna as his interpreter.