MCADAM'S WOMEN: The day her husband Kenneth died, Isla McAdam's life changed dramatically, irrevocably - and shockingly. Kenneth, twenty years her senior, has left her with two children, no money and a shameful legacy. For just as Isla knew little about his business, she knew nothing at all about his other life - with another wife, another family, another existence...

PEBBLES ON THE BEACH: Elspeth Bremner's thirteenth birthday was marked with both joy and sadness. The unexpected return of her two foster brothers, Lachlan and Thomas, granted a day's leave from their preparations for the hazardous trenches of France, was the best present Eslpeth could wish for. But it was also the anniversary of the death of Elspeth's natural mother Maisie - whose influence could still be seen in the reluctance of Elspeth's foster mother to accept the child as one of her own.