Showing titles in Holidays

Richard Ainsworth is preparing for the Christmas of his dreams: quiet, no guests at his French B&B and his favourite films on the TV. None of which seems on the cards when his rural peace is shattered by the unexpected arrival of a familiar face. Valérie d’Orçay has hotfooted it from Paris with her chihuahua in tow and an invitation to a Christmas themed murder mystery game.

When Isla reluctantly accepts her estranged sister Clara's invitation to spend Christmas at a luxury mountain retreat, she expects awkward family tension – not a fight for survival. After years of silence following their mother's death, this holiday reunion seems too good to be true. And it is.

Rebecca Neumanner's marriage is on the brink of collapse as her desire to be a mother becomes an obsession. Then she receives news from her estranged family in Rhodes. Called back to the beautiful Greek island of her birth, she realises how little she knows of the grandmother she has eluded for over a decade. Bubba has never spoken of the Nazi occupation during her youth, but there have always been whispers. What desperate measures did she take that terrible day in 1944 when her family was ripped apart? Can the rumour she had blood on her own hands really be true? But Bubba intends to take her secrets to the grave.

Rosa Larkin is down on her luck in London, so when she inherits a near-derelict corner shop in a quaint Devon village, her first thought is to sell it for cash and sort out her life. But nothing is straightforward about this legacy. While the identity of her benefactor remains a mystery, he - or she - has left one important legal proviso: that the shop cannot be sold, only passed on to somebody who really deserves it. Rosa makes up her mind to give it a go: to put everything she has into getting the shop up and running again in the small seaside community of Cockleberry Bay. But can she do it all on her own?

Willow Carruthers - British Oscar winner, style icon and mother of three - is facing a crisis: she’s broke, discovery of her partner’s infidelity has left her a single mother and, if the banks have their way, she’s about to be homeless.

Christmas is all about lists. To do lists. Shopping lists. Lists to bloody Santa. And doesn’t Anna Johnson know it. Waking up on Christmas Eve after the annual Johnson party, she's hungover, exhausted and really sick and tired of Christmas already. All she wants is to tick the last things off her endless list and sit down with the world’s biggest glass of wine. ​A mysterious death in her home really is the last thing she has time for right now, but with police officers and a husband and two kids intent on watching Christmas films, it looks like it’s up to her.

Carmen has always worked in her local department store. So, when the gorgeous old building closes its doors for good, she is more than a little lost. When her sister, Sofia, mentions an opportunity in Edinburgh - a cute little bookshop, the spare room in her house - Carmen is reluctant, she was never very good at accepting help. But, short on options, she soon finds herself pulling into the snowy city just a month before Christmas.

It is 1890, and in the days before Christmas, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson are visited at Baker Street by a new client. Eve Allerthorpe, eldest daughter of a grand but somewhat eccentric Yorkshire-based dynasty, is greatly distressed, as she believes she is being haunted by a demonic Christmas spirit. Her late mother told her terrifying tales of the sinister Black Thurrick, and Eve is sure that she has seen the creature from her bedroom window. What is more, she has begun to receive mysterious parcels of birch twigs, the Black Thurrick’s calling card.

The stockings are hanging ready, the sherry and pies are waiting by the fireplace - but where is the jolly fat man with his sack? It's not right to find Death creeping down chimneys and trying to say 'Ho ho ho'—but someone's got to bring the little kiddies their presents. Or else they might stop believing. Belief is important in Discworld, particularly on the last night of the year when the time is turning. If the real man in the red suit isn't found by morning, there won't be a morning. Ever again....

I just met my new son-in-law . . . And he’s my ex-husband. They’re here. I watch them arrive from the kitchen window. My pregnant daughter and her new husband. They’ve barely known each other six months. I greet him with a tight smile that he recognizes as fake. Luke is no good for my beautiful, fragile Cerys. He’ll break her heart. I know that because he broke mine — when he was married to me. I don’t know what he’s after. But I’m going to make it my business to find out.

Charles Dickens' story of solitary miser Ebenezer Scrooge, who is taught the true meaning of Christmas by the three ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future, has become one of the timeless classics of English literature. First published in 1843, it introduces us not only to Scrooge himself but also to the memorable characters of underpaid desk clerk Bob Cratchit and his poor family, the poorest amongst whom is the ailing and crippled Tiny Tim.

Holly has the place to herself this Christmas. It’s not her place, though – she is house-sitting for friends who live on Nightingale Square – just there to keep the place warm and cosy and only for long enough for her to sort her life out. Newly single and finding herself unsure about next steps for her career, she plans to hunker down and make some life decisions. To clear her mind, she sets off on early morning walks around a nearby lake and bumps into May, an older lady who is also new to the area, and her dapper Dachshund Monty.

I stopped believing in Santa Claus and happily-ever-afters when I lost my parents…so ten years ago I stopped trying. I threw myself into running my dad's hotel, The Diamond, where I make California dreams come true for the rich and famous. But now I realize there’s no one to come home to. I have no family, no friends, just my first ever boyfriend who works more than I do, and in three months barely even knows me.

A second chance by the sea? When Kiki Jackson's marriage falls to pieces, there's only one place that she knows she can escape to - her sister's little guesthouse in Butterfly Cove. But she's worried that turning up on bride-to-be Mia's doorstep, especially with her two adorable children in tow, will spoil her sister's imminent wedding plans! Luckily, handsome neighbour Aaron Spenser offers to share his new cottage with Kiki until she's back on her feet....

Tiny Tim, Bob Cratchit, and Ebenezer Scrooge come to marvelous life in Patrick Stewart's critically-acclaimed solo interpretation of A Christmas Carol. The star of X-Men and The Royal Shakespeare Company, Stewart has performed his one-man stage production of this holiday classic to sell-out audiences.

It is Christmas Day and at Champton Rectory, Canon Daniel Clement and his mother Audrey are joined by the residents and guests of the big house to drink, eat and be merry. At the festive feast, peace and goodwill prevail. Until two meet under the mistletoe. One of them falls down dead. And Daniel suspects murder has returned to Champton. Can Daniel and Detective Sergeant Neil Vanloo solve the crime and catch the Christmas killer?

Carmen is at a loose end. Her gorgeous bookshop is the filming site of a cheesy Christmas movie, she's been ousted from her sister's house, and the love of her life has just flown thousands of miles away. It's threatening to be a very unjolly Christmas indeed! But when the elderly owner of the shop comes to Carmen with a Christmas wish that threatens to never come true, Carmen knows she must buckle down to get the funds to save not only his trip, but the shop itself.

It's December 1810, and Lady Therese Osbaldestone is looking forward to her usual Christmas with her family at Winslow Abbey, her youngest daughter Celia's home. But then a carriage rolls up and disgorges Celia's three oldest children. Their father has contracted mumps, and their mother has sent the three - Jamie, George, and Lottie - to spend this Christmas with their grandmama in Little Moseley.

Renowned travel blogger, Donovan Cain, has been forced to return to England for the first time in ten years to spend some time with his recently widowed grandmother. It isn't long before Nova realises that Donovan is actually "little Donnie", the boy she played with during her childhood Christmases, when his family visited town for the holidays. From the pint-sized kid he used to be, he's now, tall, broad, and all kinds of attractive.

When Jenny inherits her estranged grandmother’s cottage in Sherwood Forest, she has nothing to lose - no money, no job, no friends, no family to speak of, and zero self-respect. Things can only get better.... Her grumpy but decidedly handsome new neighbour, Mack, has a habit of bestowing unsolicited good deeds on her. And when Jenny is welcomed into a rather unusual book club, life seems to finally be getting more interesting. Instead of reading, the members pledge to complete individual challenges before Christmas.