The Forces' Sweethearts


Book Description

Gripping, emotional Second World War saga for fans of Annie Groves, Shirley Dickson and Soraya Lane. 1943, and The Bluebird Girls are at the top of their game. They are touring with ENSA, visiting army bases across the world in order to boost the morale of the brave boys fighting in the desert and the jungle. The hours are long and the travelling uncomfortable, but Bea, Rainey and Ivy wouldn't be anywhere else for the world. Then tragedy strikes the group and their little showbusiness family. Their manager, Blackie, and Rainey's mother Jo find themselves with heavy new responsibilities, and the change in circumstances causes the girls themselves to reconsider their lives. For years, singing on stage has been their only dream, and they have made so many sacrifices to get where they are. But now other possibilities - relationships, babies - are on the horizon. Could this be the end for The Bluebird Girls?




Forces Sweethearts


Book Description

Drawing on both archive material and contributions from the public, this book looks at various aspects of wartime romance. It includes facsimiles of letters, postcards, telegrams, diaries, Valentine cards, honeymoon hotel bills, concert programs and press cuttings.




The Soldier's Sweetheart


Book Description

Larkville hero comes home Returning Special Forces soldier Nate Calhoun is struggling to adjust to small-town life. It's a relief to get back to the bunkhouse with only his memories and a bottle of bourbon for company. Only Sarah Anderson can see straight through Nate's surly exterior to his pain. As childhood sweethearts they were inseparable--until he left, shattering her heart. But hanging out like they used to--racing horses and shooting the breeze on the ranch--they begin to see that there really might be that spark still between them....




The Forces' Sweethearts: The Bluebird Girls 3


Book Description

1942, and singing group the Bluebird Girls have swapped the theatres of southern England for army tents in the Libyan desert. Their mission is to boost the morale of the brave British troops fighting under the hot sun, where there is no end yet in sight to the war. Bea, Rainey, and Ivy must shake off the toll the war has taken on their friends, loved ones and homes if they are to keep their own spirits up while performing so far from home. With a smile on their faces and a song in their hearts, the Bluebird Girls will keep fighting on until the very end.




Wives and Sweethearts


Book Description

What is it like to fall in love with a soldier? What is it like to be a soldier in love? Throughout history, those serving in the British Army have combined romantic relationships with their military duties. In wartime especially, all the usual emotions experienced by men and women in love are felt to a heightened degree. The sense of danger, and the sometimes years of separation imposed by service abroad, make the heartache of loss and the joy of reunion all the greater. For loved ones parted by war, writing has always been of crucial importance in maintaining contact. Even when it was difficult to send a letter, or not easy to explain feelings when one could, soldiers - be they generals, young officers or privates - have persevered. In a celebration of love on the frontline during the First and Second World Wars, the archives of the National Army Museum, replete with letters, diaries and photographs, are thrown open to reveal fascinating stories of soldiers, their wives and sweethearts. Love found, love lost and love enduring all have their place in the pages of this book.




The People’s Songs


Book Description

These are the songs that we have listened to, laughed to, loved to and laboured to, as well as downed tools and danced to. Covering the last seven decades, Stuart Maconie looks at the songs that have sound tracked our changing times, and – just sometimes – changed the way we feel. Beginning with Vera Lynn’s ‘We’ll Meet Again’, a song that reassured a nation parted from their loved ones by the turmoil of war, and culminating with the manic energy of ‘Bonkers’, Dizzee Rascal’s anthem for the push and rush of the 21st century inner city, The People’s Songs takes a tour of our island’s pop music, and asks what it means to us. This is not a rock critique about the 50 greatest tracks ever recorded. Rather, it is a celebration of songs that tell us something about a changing Britain during the dramatic and kaleidoscopic period from the Second World War to the present day. Here are songs about work, war, class, leisure, race, family, drugs, sex, patriotism and more, recorded in times of prosperity or poverty. This is the music that inspired haircuts and dance crazes, but also protest and social change. The companion to Stuart Maconie’s landmark Radio 2 series, The People’s Songs shows us the power of ‘cheap’ pop music, one of Britain’s greatest exports. These are the songs we worked to and partied to, and grown up and grown old to – from ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale’ to ‘Rehab', ‘She Loves You’ to ‘Star Man’, ‘Dedicated Follower of Fashion’ to ‘Radio Ga Ga’.




My Wicked Aunt Leonora


Book Description

Kathryn Shaw has had an eventful and unusual life considering she is only 25 years old. She is feisty, wired and generous to a fault. After spending most of her childhood in a Care Home, she convinces herself that romance is not on the cards for her. Unable to sleep from a recurring nightmare of drowning, she takes nighttime work in a bistro, just off the King’s Road in London, which enables her to paint seascapes during the day. Sharing a house with other weird tenants reinforces her suspicions that they also prefer nocturnal activities.




Odyssey of the Heart


Book Description

Written in a personal, story-telling style, Odyssey weaves excerpts of actual relationships with current and classic research to provide a better perspective on our own experiences in light of the principles of relationships. Highlights of its comprehensive coverage include the classic research on personal attraction, dating and meeting others for closeness, and the maintenance and dissolution of relationships. "Recommendations for Growth" provides an opportunity for readers to directly apply current research and theory to their own relationships. Features new to this edition include the latest research and therapeutic techniques on maintaining and enhancing relationships; a new chapter on the family with recent demographic changes and a look at the ongoing debates about the impact of cohabitation, divorce, and blended families; and new chapters on same sex relationships and the dark side of relationships, including why women stay in abusive relationships. Odyssey of the Heart serves as a text for courses on close and/or interpersonal relationships. Its accessibility and inclusion of many actual experiences will engage the general reader.




The King's Shilling and Stalag V111B


Book Description

Born in London, England in 1922, Anthony Parnell's interest in aeroplanes took hold of his imagination at an early age. He became a plane spotter with his friend at Croydon Aerodrome. As his love grew, his dream was that one day he would fly. Becoming a pilot in the RAF fulfilled that dream. On March 28, 1942 leaving at dawn on a Top Secret Mission, Anthony's flight came to an abrupt end when he made an emergency landing with his crippled plane on a beach he believed was on the English coast. He and his crew were taken prisoner and thus began his WWII experience as a Prisoner Of War in Stalag V111B. This book tells the story of Anthony's experience during that suspenseful and hopeless time, including his attempts at escape and the 1,000 kilometres walk across Europe in winter conditions that would later become known as The Death March. Per Ardua ad Astra - Through Adversity to the Stars - that is the RAF Motto, and the motto that Anthony Parnell would attempt to follow in his struggle for survival.




Victory through Harmony


Book Description

To serve the British nation in World War II, the BBC charged itself with mobilizing popular music in support of Britain's war effort. Radio music, British broadcasters and administrators argued, could maintain civilian and military morale, increase industrial production, and even promote a sense of Anglo-American cooperation. Because of their widespread popularity, dance music and popular song were seen as ideal for these tasks; along with jazz, with its American associations and small but youthful audience, these genres suddenly gained new legitimacy at the traditionally more conservative BBC. In Victory through Harmony, author Christina Baade both tells the fascinating story of the BBC's musical participation in wartime events and explores how popular music and jazz broadcasting helped redefine notions of war, gender, race, class, and nationality in wartime Britain. Baade looks in particular at the BBC's pioneering Listener Research Department, which tracked the tastes of select demographic groups including servicemen stationed overseas and young female factory workers in order to further the goal of entertaining, cheering, and even calming the public during wartime. The book also tells how the wartime BBC programmed popular music to an unprecedented degree with the goal of building national unity and morale, promoting new roles for women, virile representations of masculinity, Anglo-American friendship, and pride in a common British culture. In the process, though, the BBC came into uneasy contact with threats of Americanization, sentimentality, and the creativity of non-white "others," which prompted it to regulate and even censor popular music and performers. Rather than provide the soundtrack for a unified "People's War," Baade argues, the BBC's broadcasting efforts exposed the divergent ideologies, tastes, and perspectives of the nation. This illuminating book will interest all readers in popular music, jazz, and radio, as well as British cultural history and gender studies.