Showing results by author "Christobel Kent" in All Categories

The August heat has driven the residents of Florence to the hills and beaches of the countryside, leaving a corpse lying unnoticed amid the shrubbery of a normally busy roundabout. Sandro Cellini, meanwhile, will not be joining the crowds of holidaymakers this year. The former policeman turned private detective has a case: a man who seems to have vanished into thin air, leaving his pregnant young wife alone in the city.

In a dilapidated farmhouse out in the vast waterlogged plains of the English Fenlands, Fran awakes groggily to her baby's cries one February night and finds the bed empty beside her. Her husband, Nathan, is gone. Moving uneasily through the drafty rooms, searching for her husband, Fran soon makes a devastating discovery that upends her marriage and any semblance of safety.

Audible exclusive! Christobel Kent discusses her new novel, The Loving Husband. Can you ever truly know the one you love? Fran Hall and her husband, Nathan, live in a farmhouse on the edge of the Fens with their two children. One February night, when Fran is woken by her baby, she finds the bed empty beside her and Nathan gone. Searching the house for him, she makes a devastating discovery.

Rose Fell's friends think she's taking a big risk when she leaves the security of home and career to move to the beautiful but isolated village of Grosso, near Genoa. But after a year of emotional turmoil Rose no longer has any ties back home, and she relishes the challenges of a new start. Making a home, however, in the ravishing, haunted landscape of Italy's Riviera coast turns our to be lonelier than Rose had anticipated. And it is only when she is asked to write a profile on one of her reclusive neighbours, the once-glamorous film star Elvira Vitale, that Rose feels her new life is really beginning.

Much like the unnamed narrator of Rebecca, Alison lives her life under the radar. She has no ties, no home, and she spends her days at a backroom publishing job. Which is how she wants it. Because Alison used to be a teenager named Esme, who lived in a dilapidated house by a bleak estuary with her parents and three siblings. One night, something unspeakable happened in the house, and Alison emerged the only survivor.

Bridget has a secret - one she keeps from everyone, even her husband. One that threatens to explode when her childhood music teacher, Carmichael, walks into her dress shop. With him is a young girl on the cusp of adulthood, fresh-faced and pretty. She reminds Bridget of herself at that age, naive and vulnerable. Bridget wants him away - away from her, away from that girl. But Carmichael won’t leave her alone, won’t stop stalking her. And Bridget’s not a little girl anymore. When he pushes her too far, she snaps.

For 15 years a terrible crime lies unsolved, becoming one of the city's darkest and most shameful secrets, until one bitter winter night another body is found, at another swimming pool, and the case is reopened. Celia Donnelly had just arrived in Florence at the time of the girl's disappearance and can remember only too well the face that filled the front pages of every Italian newspaper. When word of the gruesome new discovery breaks, she is in the midst of arranging a weekend of birthday celebrations for a wealthy Englishman's wife....

Sandro Cellini hasn't set foot in La Vipera, a derelict farmhouse just outside Florence that was once home to a free-living commune, for 40 years - until the discovery of two bodies nearby leads him back there. At the start of his career, Cellini investigated an accusation that minors were being corrupted at La Vipera, but no charges were ever brought. Now, tasked with tracking down former members of the community, he has a chance to discover what really went on. But in order to learn the true nature of the commune's mission, he must face his own traumatic memories.

When Beth disappears, everyone says she’s run off with another man. She’s just a fly-by-night party girl who can’t be trusted. But Natalie, her best friend, doesn’t believe it, not at all. She’s sure something more sinister is going on. So sure that proving it just might kill her. Meanwhile, Victor, one of Beth’s and Nat’s favorite bar patrons, has fallen and ended up in the hospital. When he hears that Beth is gone, he doesn’t buy it either. And slowly, a hazy memory comes back to him. Something menacing...something important...something just out of his grasp....

One wet November in Florence a young widow of an eminent Jewish architect comes to visit Sandro Cellini, a disgraced ex-policeman and budding private detective, to ask him to investigate her husband's suicide. But the case abruptly turns into something grimmer and more urgent than he could have imagined.

An isolated Tuscan farmhouse on the edge of an ancient wood is the perfect setting for a late September holiday. As a group of old friends from university and their families gather to relax and unwind, all are hoping it will be a chance to put the tragic events of the previous year behind them. There were six of them once; now they are five. Watching the British visitors arrive from her own terrace is Anna Viola, whose family has lived for centuries in the crumbling red-brick farmhouse above Il Vignacce.

Gina Donovan arrives in Florence on a beautiful spring morning to stay with an old friend. She is hoping for nothing more than a break from her demanding young family, but as she soon finds out, this most ancient and beautiful of cities has its dark side. Within hours of her arrival, Gina meets the elegant Frances Richardson, who invites her to her birthday party. As Gina learns, Frances' party is the highlight of the expatriate calendar. This year it is to be held in the gardens beneath the city's medieval wall.

When Niccolo Rosselli, the driven, charismatic leader of a Florentine political movement, collapses at a rally, his young party immediately comes under threat. And when it emerges that his long time partner, Flavia, has disappeared, leaving behind not only a devastated husband but their newborn son, the political becomes dangerously personal - and Sandro Cellini is drafted in to investigate.

This year, the heat wave in Florence is fiercer than usual. The city's inhabitants have fled to the cool of the hills of the surrounding countryside. So it is no surprise that a corpse lies unnoticed, bloating in the humid air. Sandro Cellini, former policeman turned private detective has a case: a man who seems to have vanished into thin air - leaving his pregnant young fiancée alone in the city.

Sukie has had enough of not putting herself out there. She has had enough of her mother thinking so very little of her timid daughter. On a whim, she accepts an offer to go to a Greek island for the weekend with Jake, a man she has barely begun dating. If that isn't putting herself out here, she doesn't know what is. Heather is at the airport when she sees a young woman with an older man—and immediately she understands that the woman is in danger. Because in 15 years, Heather hasn't been able to forget what Jake did to her.

As Sandro gets to grips with the dispiriting realities of life as a private detective, touting for business among old contacts and following errant teenagers, an old case comes back to haunt him... Loni Meadows - the glamorous, charming and ruthless director of an artistic Foundation based in a castle in the hills outside Florence - is found dead in circumstances Sandro cannot convince himself are accidental. He soon finds himself drawn into the lives of the castle's highly strung community and the closed world they inhabit in the Casentino's isolated hills.

When bossy, loving, sensible Kate dies suddenly, her little sister, Rose, dutifully returns from a carefree life abroad to help Kate's widower and the two children Rose has never met. But she is unsettled to see no trace of her warm-hearted sister in the remote, dilapidated house, nor in Kate's cold, distant partner, Evan. After stumbling across a message that only her sister could have left for her, Rose's unease around the circumstances of Kate's death turns to open suspicion, but she knows better than to ask the grieving widower for answers.

Bridget's life is small and safe: she loves her husband and her son and works hard to keep her own business afloat. Then one day her world is changed forever. The music teacher who abused her walks into a shop with the teenager he's clearly grooming. Bridget is sent spiraling back into her past. Anthony begins to stalk Bridget, trying to ensure her silence - until suddenly she snaps. And now Bridget must find a way to deal with the aftermath of her actions....

Have you ever had that sense that you're being watched? And you turn suddenly, but it's just a curtain blowing in the wind? Or the dress hanging in the doorway? Nat knows something's wrong. Her best friend, Beth, would never have upped and left without saying good-bye to her. But no one believes that Beth was taken - she is a fly-by-night, a party girl who can't be trusted. No one's listening to Nat. But someone is definitely watching her.

For fans of Apple Tree Yard and The Silent Wife, The Loving Husband draws readers into a marriage where nothing is as it seems.... Fran Hall and her husband Nathan have moved with their two children to a farmhouse on the edge of the Fens - a chance to get away from London and have a fresh start.