Across the Mersey

From the author of ‘The Grafton Girls’ comes the story of one Liverpool family preparing for the onslaught of World War Two, while trying not to fight among themselves.

Jean and Vi are twins but couldn’t be more different. Jean’s proud of her honest, hardworking husband and their children, but there’s never a penny to spare. Vi’s equally proud of her husband’s new role as a local councillor and their elegant new house, and has raised her children to expect the best.

As war breaks out, agonising decisions must be faced. Should the oldest children enlist? Should the youngest be evacuated? All the traditional certainties are overturned. Then the twins’ own younger sister, singer Francine, returns home unexpectedly and stirs up the past, even in the midst of present danger.

This is a tremendous saga of fighting spirit and family closeness, and the belief that even though today is full of destruction and pain, there is hope for a better tomorrow.

Reviews

Praise for Annie Groves:

‘An engrossing story.’ My Weekly

‘A stirring and heartrending family saga…Against a backdrop of change when the suffragette movement was coming to the fore, the choices and dreams of a generation of women combine to create this passionate story.’ Liverpool Daily Post

‘Heartwrenching and uplifting in equal measure – a tragic indictment of what can happen when you swap passion for duty. Roll on the sequel!’ Take a Break

‘Written from the heart’ My Weekly

About the author

Annie Groves was born and lived in the north-west of England all of her life. She was the author of the Pride family series, Ellie Pride, Connie’s Courage and Hettie of Hope Street, for which she drew upon her own family’s history, picked up from listening to her grandmother’s stories when she was a child. Her next set of novels was the World War II series Goodnight Sweetheart, Some Sunny Day, The Grafton Girls and As Time Goes By. These were followed by the Campion series, Across the Mersey, Daughters of Liverpool, The Heart of the Family, Where the Heart Is and When the Lights Go on Again, which are also based on recollections from members of her family, who come from the city of Liverpool. My Sweet Valentine follows on from Home for Christmas and London Belles and is the third in this series, which introduces a set of glorious characters living in Article Row in Holborn.
Annie Groves, whose real name was Penny Halsall, also wrote under the name of Penny Jordan and was an international bestselling author of over 170 novels with sales of over 84 million copies.
Sadly, Penny Halsall died in 2011. She left a wonderful legacy of heart-warming novels for many more fans to discover and she will be greatly missed by all who knew her.
The final books in the Article Row series, Only a Mother Knows and A Christmas Promise, will be published posthumously in 2013.