Empire Street Books in Order

The Empire Street novels move the action to Liverpool's dockside, where narrow terraced houses look out over the River Mersey and the ships that come and go with war looming on the horizon. Empire Street is a small community of gossip, borrowed cups of sugar and families who know one another's business far too well, yet will still step in when things go wrong.

In Child of the Mersey we meet Kitty Fisher, who has held her household together since childhood, cooking and cleaning for her heavy drinking father and her unruly brothers. Her neighbour Rita Kennedy lives with her husband under the roof of a spiteful mother in law and longs for a home of her own and a second chance for their marriage. When war clouds gather, both women sense that life is about to change, though not in the ways they hope.

Christmas on the Mersey shows just how hard that change will be. The phoney war is over, the bombs are falling on Liverpool and Rita is forced to admit painful truths about her husband Charlie while clinging to the kindness of her childhood sweetheart Jack Callaghan. Kitty throws herself into work to distract from constant worry about her younger brothers and her feelings for Frank Feeny, the officer she cannot quite forget.

In The Mersey Daughter and Winter on the Mersey the focus widens to follow Kitty and Rita through fresh heartaches and new opportunities. Rita must raise her children, fend off wagging tongues and decide whether she dares to imagine a future with Jack. Kitty joins the WRENs, discovering independence and purpose in naval service, even as she is pulled back toward Empire Street and the man who first captured her heart.

Throughout the series the war is always present, from the howl of sirens to the quiet shock of a telegram being opened at the kitchen table. Yet the books are as interested in everyday detail as in big events. We see women queueing for rations, taking in lodgers, scraping together Christmas treats and making the best of blackouts and bomb damage.

The Empire Street stories are emotional, often bittersweet, but they keep a thread of hope running through the darkest nights. Readers who like character driven sagas about working class families, complicated love stories and neighbours who stick together when it counts will find plenty to explore along this one Liverpool street.