Showing results by narrator "Aoife McMahon" in All Categories

Mary Creighton was just 15 when she found herself pregnant out of wedlock in 1960s Ireland. She dreamed of a happy life with her child, but that was shattered when she was sent away to Castlepollard - a home for mothers and their unborn babies. Stripped of their clothes and forced into gruelling work whilst pregnant, those who survived childbirth were made to force-feed their children for adoption into wealthy families. Babies were ripped out of their mothers' hands, but Mary refused to let that happen to her. She managed to escape only to later lose her beautiful daughter to social services and the meddling nuns....

At Mossgrove, the Phelan family farm, longtime hired hand Jack plays peacemaker as widow Martha Phelan battles her young son, Peter, who wants to modernise the farm. Tensions on the home front are bitter enough, but at the Conway farm across the river, more trouble is brewing. Slovenly Matt Conway feels trapped and abuses his wife, Biddy. Spurred on by a misguided belief that the Phelans got the best of him in a loan to buy land, he keeps vigil at a fence post plotting revenge....

It's late at night, and the rain is pouring down on the Dublin city streets. A mother is grieving for her dead child. She stands silently outside the home of the teenage boy she believes responsible. She watches.... In a kitchen on the same square, a girl waits anxiously for her mum to come home. She knows exactly where she is, but she knows she cannot reach her. A few doors down, and a widow sits alone in her room. She has just delivered a bombshell to her family during dinner, and her life is about to change forever.

When a shocking news report shatters Juno Ryan's world, she suddenly finds herself without the man she loves - and with no way of getting the answers she so desperately needs. A distraught Juno flees to the enchanting Villa Naranja in Spain. The blue skies and bountiful orange groves - along with Pep, the winemaker's handsome son - begin to soothe her broken heart, but only Juno herself can mend it.

Dublin 1966. When Joan Quinn, a factory girl from the Cranmore Estate, marries Martin Egan, it looks like her dreams have come true. But all is not as it seems. Joan lives in the shadow of a secret—the couple's decision to give up their first daughter for adoption only months before. For the next three decades, Joan's marriage and her relationship with her second child Carmel suffer as a consequence. Then one day in 1996, a letter arrives from their adopted daughter.

It started with the judge. He was about to sentence five of Cork's most notorious criminals. But his body has just turned up, beaten and broken, on an isolated road in his burned-out car. Now four members of a rival gang have been shot, and in retaliation three civilians have been blown up. To Katie's horror, Cork is becoming a gang battleground like Dublin. Can Katie save the city? Can she save herself?

Laura lives an isolated life with her father, alone in a castle in the Austrian wilderness. When the mysterious Carmilla, a strange and beautiful lady, arrives in the night, no one suspects the supernatural occurrences that follow. But still more unsuspected is the tempestuous romance that blooms between the two young women, and Carmilla’s nightmarish secret. Written 26 years before Stoker’s "Dracula", Carmilla is the original vampire novel. Sheridan Le Fanu combines a chilling Gothic atmosphere with horrifying episodes, boldly exploring the sexual desires of his heroines, and establishing the image of the female vampire.

Leah is in love. It should be the happiest summer of her life, but she can't help feeling lonely with Jake's attention divided between her, his ex-wife and his young son. As insomnia sets in, the walls of their new basement flat feel as if they're closing in around her. Until she meets her upstairs neighbour, Anton, who has recently moved back in after a long absence from the street. He's a sympathetic ear when Jake can't be, and even though others on the street seem strangely hostile towards him, Leah soon comes to rely on Anton and their secret conversations in the night.

When Hannah learns that famed chef Daniel Costello is facing accusations of sexual assault, she's thrown back to the summer she spent waitressing at his high-end Dublin restaurant when she was a young college student—the plush splendor of the dining rooms, the wild parties after service, the sizzling tension of the kitchens. But Hannah also remembers how the attention from Daniel soon morphed from kindness into something darker. Now the restaurant is shuttered and Daniel tries to understand how his life is now completely out of his control

When Declan Lorne, the last remaining knight in Ireland, dies suddenly, an ancient title passes with him. But his estate on Ireland’s rugged south-west coast is left to his three daughters. The two eldest, Ottie and Pip, inherit in line with expectations, but to everyone’s surprise - and dismay - it is the errant baby of the family, Willow, who gets the castle. Why her? Something unknown - something terrible - made her turn her back on her family three years earlier, escaping to Dublin and vowing never to return....

Joyce Conway remembers things she shouldn't. She knows about tiny cobbled streets in Paris, which she has never visited. And every night she dreams about an unknown little girl with blonde hair.

Life is in two parts: who you were before you met her and who you are after. A documentary crew discover a mysterious young woman living alone in the mountains of West Cork. Strikingly beautiful, she has an extraordinary talent for mimicry, like the famous Australian lyrebird. The crew, fascinated, make her the subject of their story and bestow the nickname upon her. When they leave, they take Lyrebird with them back to the city.

Last year, DS Katie Maguire and her team destroyed the biggest drug trafficker in Cork. So how is the city's drug trade at an all-time high? Meanwhile, a spate of violent attacks which leave victims severely disabled has brought confidence in the Garda to an all-time low. As Katie investigates, she realises that the two cases might be connected. Someone is using brain-damaged victims to smuggle drugs into the country. And the only way to find out more is to go in undercover....

Irish fairy tales and legends - full of enchantment, brave deeds and lost loves. The best tales from the Irish tradition, including: 'How Cúchulainn Got His Name', 'The Magic Shoes', 'Deirdre and the Sons of Uisneach', 'The King’s Secret', 'The Children of Lir', 'The Giant’s Causeway', 'The Bodach of the Grey Coat', 'The Pot of Gold', 'Tír na n-Óg' and 'The White Gander'. Irish fairy tales and legends are full of enchantment, brave deeds and lost loves. Told from generation to generation, they are as fascinating now as they were to their original listeners.

On the night that Aunty dies, the Raggedy Witches come for Mup's mam. Pale, cold, relentless, they will do anything to coax Mam back to Witches Borough. When they kidnap Mup's dad, Mup and her mam must leave the mundane world to rescue him. But Mam is strange on this side of the border - striding, powerful, and distant. Even if they can save Dad, Mup is not sure anything will ever be the same again....

The simple fact of the matter is that Iris loves life. Maybe she’s forgotten that. Sometimes that happens, doesn’t it? To the best of us? All I have to do is remind her of that one simple fact. Monday morning starts like any other – until Terry discovers her best friend Iris has gone missing. Finding her takes Terry, Iris and Terry’s confused father Eugene, into an extraordinary journey – one that will change all of their lives.

Lorna Byrne says we all see angels when we are young children but are gradually conditioned to screen them out. Here, for the first time, she has written stories, inspired by real life, of seven children whose lives were transformed and made better by their interaction with their guardian angels. Among these, there is a story of a little girl called Suzy, paralysed from birth and unable to play with other children.

Orphaned as a young child, Mirin O'Malley has been brought up by her grandparents on their isolated, rambling estate Hob's Hallow. Long ago her family prospered due to a deal struck with the mer, the terrifying creatures who live in the depths of the sea: safety for their merchant ships in return for a child of each generation. But for many years the family have been unable to keep their side of the bargain and their fortunes have suffered as a result. When Mirin's grandfather dies, her grandmother puts in train a plan to restore their glory - but at the price of Mirin's freedom.

The treatment of refugees has become one of the most devastating human rights disasters in our history. In this book, award-winning journalist Sally Hayden unfolds a staggering investigation into the migrant crisis across North Africa. This book follows the experiences of refugees, telling a range of shocking and eye-opening human stories. But it also surveys the bigger picture: the negligence of NGOs and corruption within the United Nations. The economics of the twenty-first-century slave trade and the EU’s bankrolling of Libyan militias.

When Louisa arrives at Temple House, an elite catholic boarding school, she quickly finds herself drawn to sophisticated fellow pupil Victoria and their young bohemian art teacher, Mr Lavelle. The three of them form a bond that seems to offer an escape from the repressive regime of the nuns who run the cloistered school. Until Louisa and Mr Lavelle suddenly vanish. Years later, a journalist with a childhood connection to Louisa determines to resolve the mystery.