Lady Aurelia's Bequest

Shelia Walsh lives in Southport with her family. She is the established and popular author of many novels of Regency romance including the 1984 winner of the Romantic Novelists' Association Major Award: A Highly Respectable Marriage.

In Cordelia Darcy, Shelia Walsh has created one of her most delightful heroines ever. From a modest colonial background in America, she arrives in Regency London during the autumn of 1811 and makes it her stage. 
 
Before ever she steps foot in London though, Cordelia has already become part of a dangerous diplomatic intrigue as the result of her shipboard encounter with a fellow American: Drew Harvey. Working to secure peace between England and America, Mr Harvey enlists Cordelia's help as a courier - thereby drawing her into the sights of his own very determined enemies. 
 
Despite these shadows playing around her, Cordelia Darcy's first London Season is a resounding success - as if in tribute to the godmother whose bequest made it possible. And for all that she stands at the heart of a conspiracy that gathers force daily, Cordelia's story is also one of a beautiful young girl entering Society, falling in love for the first time and learning to identify her own feelings. 
 
With her use of period detail providing a sumptuous Regency backcloth throughout, Shelia Walsh combines each separate thread of Lady Aurelia's Bequest into a first class romantic thriller.

Until Tomorrow

Shelia Walsh was born in Birmingham, but has lived in Southport for many years and has been a writer for some sixteen of those years, during which time she has written eighteen historical novels, of which the seventh, A Highly Respectable Marriage, won the 1983 RNA Romantic Novel of the Year Award. She is a past chairman of the RNA, Life President of her local Writer's Circle, and is happily married to a jeweler, now retired. She has two daughters, one married - and a Burmese cat.

Ryan's Bakery is at the hub of Liverpool life in the late thirties: its driving force, Kathleen, who loves her quiet husband, Michael, and her family, and is fiercely ambitious for them all - Rita, soon to be a teacher; stage-stuck Shirely Anne; Chris, a baker like his dad, and carefee young Joey. 
 
Then a late and difficult pregnancy blunts Kathleen's ambition and presents her bright middle daughter, Liz, with a challenge. In meeting it, the enthusiastic sixteen-year-old discovers untapped creative talents, and a dream is born - that one day she will be Elizabeth Ryan, renowned for quality pastries and home-made chocolates. 
 
With her first small success, Liz makes an enemy - Alec Mannings, son of a rival baker. But she also finds an invaluable friend in Fritz Lendl, and Austrian confectioner, driven from his homeland by the Nazis. 
 
When Leigh, the dashing American flyer, first captures Liz's heart, he sees her only as an endearing gutsy kid, and she is enough of a realist to know it. Besides, there is Jimmy, the boy she has promised to marry. But during the Second World War, fate brings them together once more, and Liz is no longer a child. There are agonizing choices to be made, as time and again their love seems destined to be denied - until tomorrow.

Sheila Walsh

Scarred by her experiences on the battlefront, Aimée Buchanan, a young doctor, has come home to Liverpool. Exhaustion, fever and a tragic love affair leaves her depressed and apathetic - until she meets the Shaw family and sees the plight, firsthand, of destitute families. 
 
Apprenticed to the hateful Mrs Crawley, Matty Shaw dreams of becoming a famous designer until she is unfairly dismissed. But fate takes a hand, and Matty finds herself working as an alteration assistant at Madame Vincent's exclusive French modiste... 
 
In a story that crosses the barriers of class and social prejudice, Shelia Walsh, author of bestselling Until Tomorrow, brings to life her warm and moving novel of two women, both dedicated to their careers - both determined to succeed in a different world.

Sheila Walsh

Books by Sheila Walsh

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter