Daphne du Maurier

Ambrose Ashley, Philip's cousin, guardian and god, married Rachel in Italy, and died there. Jealous of his marriage and grief-stricken by his death, Philip prepares to meet his cousin's widow with hatred in his heart.

With beauty, brains, ambition, and the glittering decadence of Regency London to sustain her, she chose the only route that could take a cockney girl to the top, as mistress to the Royal Duke of York. But soon she provoked a scandal that rocked the country, placed the Duke on trial before Parliament, and risked losing everything.

Inspired by a grisly discovery in the 19th century, The King's General was the first of du Maurier's novels to be written at Menabilly, the model for Manderley in Rebecca. Set in the 17th century, it tells the story of a country and a family riven by civil war, and features one of fiction's most original heroines. Honor Harris is only 18 when she first meets Richard Grenvile - proud, reckless and utterly captivating. But following a riding accident,...

'I tell you your mine will be in ruins and your home destroyed and your children forgotten ... but this hill will be standing still to confound you.' So curses Morty Donovan when 'Copper John' Brodrick builds his mine at Hungry Hill. The Brodricks of Clonmere gain great wealth by harnessing the power of Hungry Hill and extracting the treasure it holds. The Donovans, the original owners of Clonmere Castle, resent the Brodricks' success, and consider...

Seeking peace of mind, Lady Donna de Colomb flees the stews of London and the Restoration court for remote Navaron. There she finds the boundless passion her spirit craves - daring to love the pirate hunted by all Cornwall.

As far as his father, an accomplished poet, is concerned, Richard will never amount to anything, and so he decides to take his fate into his own hands. But at the last moment, he is saved by Jake, who appeals to Richard not to waste his life. Together they set out for adventure.

The title story is a supernatural tale involving a British couple on holiday in Venice to escape the pain of their young daughter's recent death. An encounter with two sisters in a cafe, and the blind one's claim that she can 'see' the deceased child sitting with her parents, launches a series of events that ends violently.

As a young guide for Sunshine Tours, Armino Fabbio leads a pleasant, if humdrum life - until he becomes circumstantially involved in the murder of an old peasant woman in Rome. He gradually comes to realise she was his family's beloved servant many years ago, in his native town of Ruffano.

In this collection of suspenseful tales in which fantasies, murderous dreams and half-forgotten worlds are exposed, Daphne du Maurier explores the boundaries of reality and imagination.