Ella Carey books in order

The truth can come at a terrible price…

1923, Provence, France.

In the middle of a magical summer, artist Emma Temple gazes into fields of lavender, as her dearest friend Patrick Adams paints her portrait. Their passionate friendship is just beginning, and Emma is blissfully happy. Whatever is to come, she will have this picture as a reminder of their true love for each other. But Emma is hiding a secret that she fears may tear them apart…

1980, London, England.

On an ordinary morning, an elderly Emma opens her newspaper to find a devastating story claiming that Patrick’s painting of her is a worthless fake. Emma is stunned and shocked—surely this cannot be true? Emma has staked her granddaughter’s future on the portrait—now the bank is threatening to recall the loan. In an instant, her world is overturned as the truths she built her life on start to crumble beneath her.

Patrick was the one soul on earth who knew her deepest secret. To prove the painting is truly authentic, Emma will have to reveal the truth and it may tear her apart…

Sweetwater, Texas, 1943.

Eva has always wanted to fly away. She jumps at the chance to train with the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots and help the war effort, even if the days are exhausting, the southern nights sweltering. When she’s in the air, it’s all worthwhile: her heart soars, as close to infinity as you can get. And since she met handsome Jack, she has someone to fly back to. But on one dangerous night, everything goes wrong. When she awakes, her body is broken and her memory is gone…

Los Angeles, 1977.

Eva seems like a normal married woman with a family to be proud of. When she woke up after that terrible night—a blank in her memory—Jack was smiling down at her. But so many decades later, Eva is still searching for answers about the night that changed her life forever. Why have letters to her fellow pilots gone unanswered for thirty years? What really happened on her last flight?

Ever since that catastrophic crash, Eva has lived with the worst fear imaginable: did she do something terrible enough to make her friends cut her off? Increasingly overcome by frightening flashbacks, where she is fighting to escape from a tiny cockpit filled with smoke as her plane falls to the ground, she desperately tries to uncover the truth. But are some secrets best left buried in the past?

1942, New York. As war rages in Europe, Lily Rose is grateful for her perfect life: the love of her wealthy uptown parents in their beautiful brownstone overlooking the park and her dream job as a chef at one of New York’s finest restaurants, the art deco dream that is Valentino’s. But in her heart, Lily is drawn towards the bohemian Sicilian community in Greenwich Village, where gorgeous fresh fruit spills onto the pavement and the smell of freshly baked cannoli tempt her inside every Italian deli.

Part of the attraction is Tom Morelli, talented chef and handsome grandson of Sicilian immigrants, whose deep brown eyes call to her and set her heart on fire. As wartime rationing bites in the city, Lily and Tom stay up late, dreaming up delicious meals that will see Valentino’s through the war and distract New Yorkers from the threat of sons and sweethearts being called up. Lily knows he has found the key to her heart.

Then Tom receives a devastating summons that changes everything: he is drafted to Italy. He must return to his beautiful homeland to fight a desperate war.

Suddenly alone, with only the memory of Tom’s last kiss, Lily turns to her parents for support. But when her mother finds out about her relationship, she is furious. When the war ends, Lily’s duty is to marry the man picked for her, raise children and never work again. They give her a heartbreaking ultimatum: end her relationship with Tom and give up her job or lose her family and inheritance forever.

Lily knows she must follow her heart to Valentino’s and to Tom. But when Tom is declared missing in action, Lily is totally heartbroken. If she pursues her dreams, will there be anything left for her when the war is over?

1946, Berlin. War correspondent Kate Mancini is in Germany, reporting on the aftermath of the devastating war. For her readers back home in New York, she tells the stories of innocent families, trying to rebuild the wreckage of their lives now the soldiers have left at last. But in the Russian-held sector of Berlin on an icy winter’s day, Kate breaks all the rules, rescuing Mia Stein, a silent orphan who she fears will otherwise perish.

Together with her fellow journalist, handsome Rick Shearer, Kate manages to find a safe house for Mia before she returns to America and vows to keep in touch. Back home, the reality of post-war life for women is stark. Whilst Rick walks into his dream job, no newspaper will hire a woman. The editors laugh her out of their offices, telling her to get married and raise a family. Rick does all he can to support her, as she takes her first steps towards the new medium of television news, and their friendship deepens into something more.

Then tragedy strikes: Rick is falsely named as a communist sympathizer. He is arrested, blacklisted and faces prison.

Kate knows she must do all she can to free the man she loves. But that means returning to Germany, to seek out the little orphan girl who is her only chance at salvation. Kate and Rick saved Mia—will she help them both now? And even if Kate succeeds, freedom might never be hers when she returns home…

Paris, 1918. The end of war is in sight, and young seamstress Vianne Mercier is longing for the day when she can stop sewing military uniforms and start creating the beautiful dresses that she has been dreaming up in her head.

But just when it seems like peace is within reach, Vianne’s mother and sister are killed in a terrible air raid. To make matters worse, Vianne’s brother has returned home a changed man. Controlling and cruel, he presents Vianne with an ultimatum; give up her dreams of becoming a designer, or be forced onto the streets, penniless and alone.

With nothing left for her in Paris but sad memories, she decides to sail for New York. Determined not to look back, she throws herself into her new life—spending her days sewing dresses for wealthy Upper East Side women, and her evenings dancing the Charleston to Duke Ellington in the new downtown clubs. When Vianne meets handsome Italian Giorgio Conti, he encourages her career, and she feels safe for the first time since she lost her family.

Then news of a terrible accident compels Vianne to suddenly return to France, where she discovers proof of a wartime secret that changes everything she thought she knew about her family. Facing the threat of sickness and ruin, the people who forced Vianne out of her home now suddenly need her help.

Will Vianne find the courage to follow her heart, return to New York and her life with Giorgio? Or will duty bind her to the family she had left behind and force her to remain in France?

1940, Paris.

Life is getting desperate for young Isabelle de Florian. Alone with her best friend in her apartment as the Germans tighten their hold on Paris, Isabelle knows that they must seek safety or die. For months she has been playing a dangerous game of secrets with the Nazis, trying to keep the people she loves safe. At last, she secures passage out of the city, packs her best jewels into a small suitcase and steps into the treacherous night…

New York, 2015.

Photographer Cat Jordan is shocked when she receives a letter informing her that she is the sole heir of the estate of Isabelle de Florian. She was a friend of Cat’s enigmatic grandmother, who both lived in France until the Nazi occupation forced them to flee. The letter offers few details but is clear on one point: Cat must come to Paris in person.

When she arrives, Cat is enchanted by Isabelle’s beautiful apartment. But why did she leave it to a stranger? Determined to find the truth, Cat investigates her grandmother and Isabelle’s escape from Paris, and discovers that Isabelle was hunted by the Nazis in 1940. But as Cat searches through the dusty letters in the apartment, will the secret she finds change everything she knows about Isabelle and herself?

Anna is content with her well-ordered life in San Francisco. But her world is turned upside down when her beloved grandfather, Max, reveals a startling secret: Anna is part of an aristocratic family who lost everything during World War II. What’s more, Max was forced to leave behind a precious item over seventy years ago in their estate in old Prussia. It’s now his ardent wish that Anna retrieve it.

Anna burns with questions as she heads for Germany: What memento could be so important to her grandfather? And why did he keep their history hidden? As she searches for answers, she finds herself drawn to Wil, a man who may hold the key to unlock the mystery. Together they discover that her family’s secrets are linked with an abandoned apartment in Paris, and these secrets go deeper than she ever imagined.

Alternating between 1930s Europe and the present, The House by the Lake illuminates the destiny of a family caught in the tumult of history.

England, 1895.

Louisa West, a young beauty from Boston, looks like she has it all: a handsome husband, she is lady of Ashworth Manor and one day she’ll be a duchess. But in truth, her life is falling apart. Louisa’s honeymoon is barely over when her husband deserts her, leaving her devastated and alone. She flees to Paris, longing to escape her grief, but finds only tragedy…

Boston, 2015.

Life hasn’t been kind to Sarah West. In one year, she has lost both her parents and her marriage. After her father’s death, Sarah is sorting through his belongings when she finds a letter about her mysterious ancestor, Louisa. There have always been whispers in the family about Louisa’s suicide—from a high balcony in Paris—but as Sarah reads, she starts to question everything she was told. Desperate to leave her broken heart behind, she books a trip to Paris to find out more…

When Sarah arrives in the city of lights, the cobbled streets of Montmartre and the river Seine at twilight make her heart sing. Then, on the bookshelf of a beautiful Paris apartment, hidden inside the yellowing pages of an old novel, she finds a note about Louisa which shatters Sarah’s understanding of her family’s past. Did Louisa really throw herself from a Paris balcony? And when Sarah uncovers the truth, will it change everything about her future?

In 1946, artist Rebecca Swift’s dreams of love and a life free from convention are crashing like the waves of the Australian coast below her. And it’s into those roiling waters that she disappears.

Forty-one years later, Tess Miller’s dreams are crashing, too. The once-successful New York editor has lost her most prestigious author to the handsome new golden boy of publishing. Meanwhile, she’s stuck with Edward Russell, a washed-up Australian poet writing a novel about some obscure artist named Rebecca Swift. But Tess may have underestimated Russell. His book is not only true—it’s a searing, tragic romance and a tantalizing mystery set in a circle of postwar modernists. When Tess uncovers a long-hidden secret, she’s drawn even deeper into Rebecca’s enigmatic life and death.

As Rebecca’s past intertwines with the present, Tess finds herself falling for the last man she thought she’d ever be drawn to. On the way, she discovers the power of living an authentic life—and that transcendent love never really dies.