Throughout 2016, these novels, originally published as Frances McNeil novels, will begin a new life as Frances Brody books. They will be reissued by Piatkus, starting in the New Year with Sisters on Bread Street.

Keep up with the new editions on Frances Brody's website.

Sisters on Bread Street / Somewhere Behind the Morning

The author's mother, Julia, lived on Bread Street, Leeds up to the age of eleven when she was orphaned. Sisters on Bread Street was written for Julia. The original edition is no longer available because the material was revised to form the novel first published as Behind the Morning, and now reissued under its original title.

Behind the Morning won the Harper Collins Elizabeth Elgin Award for the Most Regionally Evocative Debut Saga of the Millennium.

Leeds, 1914. Sisters Julia and Margaret Wood are struggling to rise above devastating poverty, while the threat of war looms large over their community. Angry feelings about foreigners have reached boiling point; their German-Jewish father's search for work proves hopeless, leaving entrepreneurial Julia to keep the family afloat by hawking homemade pies on the streets of Leeds.

Her beautiful elder sister Margaret, an apprentice milliner and new member of the suffragette set, seeks a faster way out of the daily grind, pinning her hopes on a rich suffragette's journalist son, Thomas.

But as the war rages on, it is left to Julia to discover the true meaning of courage and family, as she learns to look forward to the start of the new day - and the promise of a better life ahead.

Sisters on Bread Street was published by Piatkus on 7th January 2016, and is available from Amazon in paperback (also available from any bookshop or library, ISBN: 978-0-3494-1070-8) or for Kindle.

Read about Sisters on Bread Street on the Frances Brody website.

Sixpence in her Shoe

A captivating follow up to Somewhere Behind the Morning, set in Leeds and Morecambe Bay in the 1920s and 1930s.

When Jessica Price was a little girl, her father, a shoe mender, gave her a beautiful new pair of shoes with a sixpence hidden in the toe of one. 'From the fairies,' he explained: 'For luck and to show you have far to go in life'. But Jess makes her own luck.

Growing up in working-class Leeds in the aftermath of the Great War, Jess is torn between her mild-mannered father and her cantankerous, ambitious mother. Although she submits to her mother's strict Catholic upbringing she finds an escape in creating fairy-tales - with her childhood soul mate, Wilf, providing the illustrations.

As Jess and Wilf grow up their love grows with them and life seems settled. While Wilf pursues his dream of becoming a successful sculptor, Jess fights to save her godchild from the orphanage - a battle that will transform their lives.

Sixpence in her Shoe was reissued by Piatkus on 7th April 2016, and is available now from Amazon in paperback (also available from any bookshop or library, ISBN: 978-0-3494-1070-8) or for Kindle.

Read about Sixpence in her Shoe on the Frances Brody website.

Halfpenny Dreams / Sisters of Fortune

Sophie and Rosa Moran are born into a working class family struggling to rise above poverty. Their father is a lowly employee at Thackreys Bank, a powerful family-run concern.Sophie and her sister first come into contact with the Thackrey family - especially young Lydia as children through their father's job. They form an improbable yet ultimately enduring friendship.

Years later, their paths cross again when Barney Moran is sacked from the bank, and the girls beg Mr Thackrey for help. Swept up in a dramatic chain of events involving murder, robbery and injustice, the lives of the two families are changed for ever.

Sisters of Fortune will be reissued by Piatkus on 7th July 2016, under the title Halfpenny Dreams. It is available for advance order from Amazon in in paperback (or from any bookshop; ISBN: 978-0-3494-1073-9) and for Kindle.

Read about Halfpenny Dreamse on the Frances Brody website.