WHILE WE'RE APART

The gripping new Second World War novel from The Sunday Times Top Ten bestselling author.

It is now 1942 and Mary Jones has just celebrated her eighteenth birthday. She has said goodbye to her childhood sweetheart Jack, when she learns that a bombing raid has killed her parents and destroyed her Sussex home. The discovery of her father's battered trunk amid the ruins reveals a shocking secret – and Mary travels to Cliffehaven in search of answers to the life-changing revelations hidden in the pages of her father's diaries. Mary is billeted with Peggy's fearsome sister Doris, but the presence of the cheerful Cockney evacuee, Ivy, brings a new friendship as well as a combined and spirited defence against Doris. She goes to work at the Kodak factory which handles the Airgraphs, and is persuaded to play the piano in Rosie's pub. Wary of Tommy Findlay who tried to pick her up one night, she nevertheless forms a strong friendship with Rosie Braithwaite. When warm-hearted Peggy befriends Mary, she learns why the girl has come to Cliffehaven, and offers to do all she can to help her find the man who was her real father. But when Ron reveals that it is none other than Tommy Findlay, Peggy begins to regret getting involved. She knows too many secrets she dare not share, and if the truth of Mary's parentage should come to light it would bring trouble to all concerned, especially to her best friend Rosie Braithwaite.