SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE In a red brick mansion block off the Marylebone Road, Vivien, a sensitive, bookish girl grows up sealed off from both past and present by her timid refugee parents. Then one morning a glamorous uncle appears, dressed in a mohair suit, with a diamond watch on his wrist and a girl in a leopard-skin hat on his arm. Why is Uncle Sándor so violently unwelcome in her parents' home? This is a novel about survival - both banal and heroic - and...

Mikey is a Romany Gypsy and grew up living in a caravan on sites across the UK. He adored his family and the rich and vibrant Romany culture he'd inherited. Eventually though he was forced to make a heartbreaking decision - to stay and keep secrets, or escape and find somewhere to finally belong. But Mikey quickly discovers that life in the outside world isn't all he expected. After learning his father had put a contract out on him and that he was being hunted down by...

Penguin Doctor Who: Time Lord Fairy Tales read by Tom Baker, Paul McGann, Joanna Page, Michelle Gomez, Adjoa Andoh, Ingrid Oliver, Anne Reid, Dan Starkey, Sophie Aldred, Rachael Stirling, Samuel Anderson, Nicholas Briggs, Pippa Bennett-Warner, Yasmin Paige & Andrew Brooke. A collection of dark and ancient fairy tales from the world of Doctor Who, these captivating stories include mysterious myths and legends about heroes and monsters of all kinds...

In this timely and essential audiobook that offers a fresh take on the qualms of modern day life, Professor Alan Lightman investigates the creativity born from allowing our minds to freely roam, without attempting to accomplish anything and without any assigned tasks. We are all worried about wasting time. Especially in the West, we have created a frenzied lifestyle in which the twenty--four hours of each day are carved up, dissected, and reduced down to ten minute units...

I killed my best friend. I didn't mean to, but I did. This is my story.' Miles Kendrick is in a witness protection program, hiding from the mob and constantly haunted by his best friend's death. With the aid of psychiatrist Allison Vance, Miles is trying to hold onto his sanity and to recall the events of that tragic night. But when Allison is blown to pieces by a bomb planted in her office, Miles becomes caught up in a deadly conspiracy way beyond his worst nightmares . . .

It is the heady 60s in Liverpool, and the Flowers, the Baileys, and the McDowds are three very different families bound together by music. The children are determined to be part of the glamour that surrounds the city, so when Sean, Lachlan, and Max form The Merseysiders and Jeannie and Rita become part of The Flower Girls, they put their hearts and souls into achieving success. The greatest star of all is Sean McDowd, who is adored by women; but Jeannie Flowers has...

Her throne awaits ... if she can live long enough to take it.It was on her 19th birthday that the soldiers came for Kelsea Glynn. They'd come to escort her back to the place of her birth – and to ensure she survives long enough to be able to take possession of what is rightfully hers. But like many 1-year-olds, Kelsea is unruly, has high principles and believes she knows better than her elders. Unlike many 19-year-olds, she is about to inherit a kingdom that is on its knees...

O. Henry, the pseudonym of the American writer William Sydney Porter (1862-1910), is best known for writing stories full of wit, wordplay, and warm characterizations, and particularly for their clever twist endings. This volume contains 20 of O. Henry's best and best-loved stories. They are marked by coincidence and surprise endings, as well as the compassion and high humor that have made O. Henry's stories popular for the last century. The stories contained in this...

In Citizens of London, Lynne Olson has written a work of World War II history even more relevant and revealing than her acclaimed Troublesome Young Men. Here is the behind-the-scenes story of how the United States forged its wartime alliance with Britain, told from the perspective of three key American players in London: Edward R. Murrow, Averell Harriman, and John Gilbert Winant. Drawing from a variety of primary sources, Olson skillfully depicts the dramatic...

Inspired by Garden & Gun magazine's popular "Good Dog" column, a rich collection of true stories celebrating the unique relationship between humans and their canine companions, penned by some of today's top writers, including Jon Meacham, Roy Blount, Jr, Dominique Browning, and P.J. O'Rourke. When Garden & Gun magazine debuted a column aptly named "Good Dog," it quickly became one of the publication's most popular features in print.

Most people only know one London; but what if there were several? Kell is one of the last Travelers—magicians with a rare ability to travel between parallel Londons. There's Grey London, dirty and crowded and without magic, home to the mad king George III. There's Red London, where life and magic are revered. Then, White London, ruled by whoever has murdered their way to the throne. But once upon a time, there was Black London...

In this book, Lintott describes the exciting discoveries that people all over the world have made, from galaxies to pulsars, exoplanets to moons and from penguin behaviour to old ship's logs. The world of science has been transformed. Where once astronomers sat at the controls of giant telescopes in remote locations, praying for clear skies, now they have no need to budge from their desks, as data arrives in their inbox. And what they receive is overwhelming; projects now...

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. A Tale of Two Cities, Dickenss only historical novel, sets personal happiness against the terrors of the French Revolution where the search for social justice sacrifices individual rights. Dr Manette has emerged from eighteen years unjust imprisonment in the Bastille: by an ironic twist of fate, his daughter Lucies marriage draws the family into a terrifying web of circumstance which, it seems, can only end in death...

On a gruelling flight from Glasgow to Australia, Joanna copes with what most mothers dread: a newborn that will not stop crying. Ill herself, Joanna tries to soothe baby Noah to no avail, and to the consternation of her fellow passengers. Alistair is finally able to settle his son, but not too long before they have to disembark and begin a long drive to...

A Genius Performance by Ian Holm, Robert Stephens, Dame Peggy Ashcroft, Jeremy Brett, Michael York, Cyril Cusak and Nigel Davenport! This production of Shakespeare's classic tragedy is the best we have heard! In very short supply and only just in front of the Naxos - Kenneth Branagh production 

Here are all the Hoffnung recordings preserved in the BBC Archives. Includes The Oxford Union Speech with the Bricklayer story and the hotelier offering French widows in every bedroom, the Charles Richardson interviews from Saturday Night on the Light and Hoffnung talking about his life and music.

This two CD set is drawn from the BBC Radio broadcasts of Ted Hughes and features live and studio recordings of the poet introducing and reading his own work. The recordings include his earliest surviving poetry broadcast and extensive selections from 'Remains of Elmet' and 'Moortown Diary' plus selections from his 'Crow' poems and two complete short stories, 'The Harvesting' and 'Snow'. Hughes was Poet Laureate from 1984 until his death in 1998 and is widely...

Shortlisted for the British Book Awards, Biography of the Year, 2007. Is it possible for humans to discover the key to happiness through a larger than life, bad-boy dog? Just ask the Grogans. The New York Times bestseller, with over 2 million copies of the book in print, read by the author. John and Jenny were just beginning their life together. They were young and in love, with a perfect little house and not a care in the...

In this first prose history in European civilization, Herodotus tells the heroic tale of the Greeks' resistance to the vast invading force assembled by Xerxes, King of Persia. The great battles of Marathon, Thermopylae and Salamis are read. The reading is supplemented by Malipiero.

Lady Chatterleys husband returns from the War paralysed from the waist down. Frustrated by his attitudes as much as his disability, she begins a love\-affair with the gamekeeper, Mellors. She realises that to be fully alive she must live the life of the body as well as the mind, but in doing so she angers the conventions of her day. Banned for over 30 years for the explicit nature of its language and descriptions of sex...

THE PLANETS is Dava Sobel's sweeping look at our heavenly galaxy. In the spirit of Longitude and Galileo's Daughter, Sobel once again brings science and history deftly to life as she explores the origins of the planets and reveals the exotic environments that exist in each of these fascinating alien worlds. After the huge national and international...

This second volume of stories celebrating key female writers includes such icons as Kate Chopin, Mary Shelley and Virginia Woolf. The collection also includes the exclusive first-ever recording of The Watsons, an early work by Jane Austen.

The original six radio monologues written by Lynne Truss, author of the phenomenal bestsellers 'Eats, Shoots & Leaves' and 'Talk to the Hand'. In the tradition of Alan Bennett’s 'Talking Heads' come Lynne Truss’s female monologues: six bittersweet tales of love, romance, friendship and family from the classic BBC...

A rock, a hard place and the biggest legal battle the planet has ever seen. Kyle McAvoy is one of the outstanding legal students of his generation: he's good looking, has a brilliant mind and a glittering future ahead of him. But he has a secret from his past, a secret that threatens to destroy his fledgling career ....

Jane Dixon is a dating disaster. Flammable tablecloths and broken arms are just a typical evening for her unlucky companions. No wonder Jane never gets past a first date. But luckily her co-worker and new bff says he's got loads of friends who'd date her more than once. If only she could stop thinking about...

There was a time when monsters and dragons roamed the earth and the gods walked among us. A time of blood, swords and furious battles. A time of legends, heroes, darkness and death . . . The first in a series of masterful retellings of classic myths from Anthony Horowitz.

A special compilation from Eyewitness, a unique history of Britain in the 20th century, written by Joanna Bourke and narrated by Tim Pigott-Smith. Eyewitness provides a rare and fascinating opportunity to hear the events of the century described by those who saw them happen.

The Picture of Dorian Gray is an 1891 philosophical novel by Irish writer and playwright Oscar Wilde. First published as a serial story in the July 1890 issue of Lippincott's Monthly Magazine, the editors feared the story was indecent, and without Wilde's knowledge, deleted five hundred words before publication.

A unique recording with Dylan Thomas reading his own work, as he meant it to be read. Because Dylan Thomas often wrote as much for the sound of his poetry as for its meaning, he was extraordinarily well-suited to the task of interpreting his own works on audio ...

When the newly qualified vet, James Herriot, arrives in the small Yorkshire village of Darrowby, he has no idea of the new friends he will meet or adventures that lie ahead.

These CDs contain episodes from the fifth and sixth series of the radio comedy show "Dead Ringers". Once again Jon Culshaw, Jan Ravens and fellow impersonators ransack the worlds of politics and broadcasting in the name of comedy. Favouites such as "Brian Perkins" and "The Doctor" are featured.

Brideshead Revisited is Evelyn Waugh's stunning novel of duty and desire set amongst the decadent, faded glory of the English aristocracy in the run-up to the Second World War.

Performed brilliantly by Jeremy Irons

For where is any author in the world teaches such beauty as a women's eye? The King of Navarre persuades his courtiers to join him in renouncing the world for three years of study. Foremost amongst their undertakings is a promise to forsake the company of women;

This sequel to "The Bear's Tears" continues the story of Kenneth Aubrey, a member of British Intelligence. The plot takes him from East Germany to Russia and Nepal, where his life is alternately threatened by a member of East German Intelligence and a senior KGB officer.

Doctor Finlay's relationship with nurse Angus continues to be on and off, whilst Doctor Cameron's surgery is due to move from Levenford town centre to Tannochbrae, on the shores of Loch Lomond.

Mary Barton is the daughter of a good and upright trade unionist, John Barton. She attracts two men, Jem Wilson, a fellow worker, and Henry Carson, son of her father's employer. When the union men decide upon murder John Barton is the chosen assassin of Henry Carson. Suspicion falls, however, on Jem, and...

No book in modern times has matched the uproar sparked by The Satanic Verses. Furore aside, it is a marvellously erudite study of good and evil. The book begins with two Indians plummeting from the sky after the explosion of their airliner, and proceeds through a series of metamorphoses, dreams and revelations.

In the usually peaceful town of Eastvale, a simmering tension has now reached breaking point. An anti-nuclear demonstration has ended in violence, leaving one policeman stabbed to death.

This new edition focuses on the Sonnets as poetry - sometimes strikingly individual poems, but often subtly interlinked in thematic, imagistic and other groupings.

The oldest long poem in Old English, written about 1000 AD, "Beowulf" tells the story of a great warrior in Southern Scandinavia in both youth and maturity. The monster Grendel terrorizes the Scyldings of Hrothgar's Danish Kingdom until Beowulf defeats him. As a result, he has to face her enraged mother. Beowulf dies after a battle against a fierce dragon.

Middle age took Jane Shilling by surprise. She hadn't seen it coming, and she certainly wasn't ready for it. Living a flawed, bittersweet version of the idyll she dreamed of in her twenties, in a tumbledown urban cottage by the Thames, with a son, a cat and a horse in a livery fifty miles away, she wondered whether middle age was the beginning of the end. Or was there one last great adventure to be had?

Malcolm Fox and his team are back, investigating whether fellow cops covered up for Detective Paul Carter. Carter has been found guilty of misconduct, but what should be a simple job is soon complicated by a brutal murder and a weapon that should not even exist.

Agatha Christie’s most daring crime mystery - an early and particularly brilliant outing of Hercule Poirot, ‘The Murder of Roger Ackroyd’, with its legendary twist, changed the detective fiction genre for ever. Roger Ackroyd knew too much. He knew that the woman he loved had poisoned her brutal first husband.

This astonishing novel that parallels the great American classic novel, Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, has been twelve years in the making. Now, the most beloved and most widely-read saga of the American Civil War is retold from the point of view of its unrivalled hero, the dashing and enigmatic scion of the South, Rhett Butler. See what Rhett is really thinking as he sits in the armchair listening to Scarlett declare her love for Ashley. Find out what happened on...

While 1858 in London may have been noteworthy for its broiling summer months and the related stench of the sewage-filled Thames River, the year is otherwise little remembered. And yet, historian Rosemary Ashton reveals in this compelling microhistory, 1858 was marked by significant, if unrecognized, turning points. For ordinary people, and also for the rich, famous, and powerful, the months from May to August turned out to be a summer of consequence.

Thousands of years of poor farming and ranching practices—and, especially, modern industrial agriculture—have led to the loss of up to 80 percent of carbon from the world’s soils. That carbon is now floating in the atmosphere, and even if we stopped using fossil fuels today, it would continue warming the planet. In The Soil Will Save Us, journalist and bestselling author Kristin Ohlson makes an elegantly argued, passionate case for "our great green hope"—a way in which...

Edited and with an introduction by Roxane Gay, the New York Times best-selling and deeply beloved author of Bad Feminist and Hunger, this anthology of first-person essays read by all 30 contributors, including Gabrielle Union, Ally Sheedy and Lyz Lenz, tackles rape, assault and harassment head-on. In this valuable and timely anthology, cultural critic and best-selling author Roxane Gay collects original and previously published pieces that address what it means to live in a...

This exciting second book in the Lost series tells the incredible true story of the doomed Apollo 13 moon mission that nearly ended in disaster. On April 11, 1970, the Apollo 13 space shuttle set off for the third intended American moon landing. Two days later and 200,000 miles from Earth, disaster struck when an oxygen tank exploded onboard the spacecraft, leaving three astronauts with only one goal: to make it home alive. From "Houston, we've had a problem" to...

Nora Buchbinder—formerly rich and now broke—would be the last woman in Brooklyn to claim #MeToo, but when a work assignment reunites her with her childhood best friend, Beth, she finds herself in a hall of mirrors. Was their eighth grade teacher Beth's lover or her rapist? Where were the grown-ups? What should justice look like, after so much time has passed? And what can Nora do, now? Nora’s memories, and Beth’s, and those of their classmates, their former teacher,

Spiritual disciplines often seem remote from the realities of our daily lives. Yet there is a Mahayana Scripture which presents a model of enlightened practice in the midst of urban living, the Vimalakirti Sutra. This teaches a non-dualistic wisdom and reconciliation of dichotomies. It challenges ordinariness and reveals systematic and effective ways of tapping higher potentials while upholding one's usual responsibilities and enriching long-term relationships.

"Winner of the 2017 Man Booker Prize In his long-awaited first novel, American master George Saunders delivers his most original, transcendent and moving work yet. Unfolding in a graveyard over the course of a single night, narrated by a dazzling chorus of voices, Lincoln in the Bardo is a literary experience unlike any other, for no one but Saunders could conceive it. February 1862. The Civil War is less than one year old. The fighting has begun in earnest, and the nation...

England, 1470. A kingdom divided against itself cannot stand. The Yorkist king Edward IV is driven out of England, his wife and children forced to seek sanctuary from the House of Lancaster. Yet rage and humiliation prick Edward back to greatness. He lands at Ravenspur, with a half-drowned army and his brother Richard at his side. Though every hand is against them, though every city gate is shut, they have come home. The brothers York will not go quietly into banishment.

As a Live performance this pulls stories from several other titles byt the same author. Every book tells a story... And the 70 titles in the Pocket Penguins series are emblematic of the renowned breadth of quality that formed part of the original Penguin vision in 1935, and that continues to define our publishing today. Together, they tell one version of the unique story of Penguin. Gervase Phinn's fond memoirs of life as a school inspector have shown his homeland of Yorkshire..

Twenty Tales from the War Zone brings together some of the highlights of John Simpson's remarkable journalistic career. Guerrillas in Colombia, Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, a flatulent Colonel Gadaffi. It's a rollercoaster ride that is sure to thrill anyone who dares to join it...

Here is Radio 4's Today presenter and national treasure John Humphrys' funny memoir of building his home in Greece with his son, Christopher. It was a moment of mad impulse when John Humphrys decided to buy a semi-derelict cottage and a building site on a plot of land overlooking the Aegean. A few minutes gazing out over the most glorious bay he had ever seen was all it took to persuade him. After all, his son Christopher was already raising his family there so he...

Praxis Duveen is a survivor. At five years old, in 1920s England, she is still innocent, the product of an unstable mother and a flighty father who abandoned Praxis and her half-crazy sister, Hypatia. As the decades fly by, Praxis experiences many incarnations, from prostitute to rape victim, wife to adulteress and eventually becomes the accidental leader of an international women's movement.Now, from her dingy basement apartment, where she's attempting to write a...

The long awaited story of one of Britain’s greatest comic legends. Some people walk on stage and the audience warms to them. You can't explain it, and you shouldn't try. It's an arrogant assumption to say you 'decide' to become a comedian. The audience decides for you' Eric Sykes, December 2001 From his early days writing scripts for Bill Fraser and Frankie Howerd through decades of British radio and television comedy – Educating Archie, Sykes And A…, Curry and Chips,

One day, sitting in traffic, Stella Sweeney attempts a good deed. The resulting car crash changes her life. But in this event is born the seed of something which will take Stella thousands of miles from her old life, turning an ordinary woman into a superstar, wrenching her whole family apart. For the first time real, honest-to-goodness happiness is just within her reach. But is Stella Sweeney, Dublin housewife, ready to grasp it?

Vicky Rai, the son of a high-profile minister, has been shot dead by one of the guests at his own party. They are a glitzy bunch, but among them the police find six strange, displaced characters with a gun in their possession, each of them steaming with a secret motive. India's wiliest investigative journalist, Arun Advani, makes it his mission to nail the murderer. In doing so, the amazing, tender and touching lives of six eccentric characters unravel before our eyes.

Five Stories selected and read by Martin Jarvis. The stories include - The Christmas Truce, Only Just In Time, The Midnight Adventure of Miss Montague, William and the Musician and William Leads a Better Life.

Don’t panic! The Hitchhiker’s saga returns once again with a full-cast dramatisation of So Long and Thanks For All the Fish, the fourth book in Douglas Adams’s famous ‘trilogy in five parts’. ‘At the risk of being controversial, it’s better than the book... Hitchhiking is back – long may it continue.’ Guy Clapperton, Radio Times The Earth has miraculously reappeared and, even more miraculously, Arthur Dent has found it. Returning to his cottage after... well... ages, he falls in love...

Tom Baker stars in this BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of John le Carré’s powerful thriller. In the third year of perestroika, London publisher Barley Blair is sent a manuscript from Moscow. Exposing Russian nuclear threats as a sham, the information - if it’s genuine - could shatter East-West relations. Jazz-loving, hard-drinking Blair is hardly the spymasters’ idea of the perfect agent, yet they are forced to send him to Moscow to make contact. But the Cold War thaws...

"""A splendid history of mind-body medicine...a book that desperately needed to be written."" ―Jerome Groopman, New York Times" Is stress a deadly disease on the rise in modern society? Can mind-body practices from the East help us become well? When it comes to healing, we believe we must look beyond doctors and drugs; we must look within ourselves. Faith, relationships, and attitude matter. But why do we believe such things? From psychoanalysis to the...

Ranging from anthology pieces such as 'Weathers' to the love poems, this work includes poems, nearly 80 in total, which are set in the context of the author's life and thought, including personal writings by him and those closest to him. He wrote after the death of his first wife and the meditations on war and philosophy.

A mother. A daughter. A family torn apart. The heartbreaking true story of an unimaginable betrayal For the first six years of her life, Sarah Harris was a normal, happy, popular little girl. But from the age of six her life was a living hell - as she became the victim of a vicious eighteen-month hate campaign. Before long she was suspended from school, alienated from her friends, completely bewildered and utterly terrified. Her happy childhood had been destroyed forever.

When the Metropolitan Police fail to realise a serial killer is at work, London ignites over the fact that the killer's victims are young black and mixed race boys. Institutionalised racism is claimed by the community's activists and tabloids alike. Acting Superintendent Thomas Lynley is given the case, and his Scotland Yard task force is soon handling more killings and a looming tragedy.

A classic novel which follows Stephen Dedalus as he progresses from boyhood to his coming of age in Ireland at the beginning of the 20th century, describing his sexual awakening, his intellectual development and his rebellion against Roman Catholicism. From the author of Dubliners, Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake.

A Genius Performance by Michael Jayston! Commander Dalgliesh is recuperating from a life-threatening illness when he receives a call for advice from an elderly friend who works as a chaplain in a home for the disabled on the Dorset coast. Dalgliesh arrives to discover that Father Baddeley has ....

Thomas Hardy's novels about the cruel twists of fate that blight our lives have a timeless power to move us. In The Mayor Casterbridge, a young Michael Henchard makes a rash, alcohol-fuelled decision to sell his wife. Despite abstaining from alcohol from this point forward and living an upstanding life.... Naxos

Alec Guiness, Cyril Cusack, and Jill Bennet perform in this unabridged version of King Lear. Interpreted in traditional Shakespearean style, the sound effects are effectively done to augment the performances.

Peter was a confirmed loner and cat hater, until he was given a small, grey (and impeccably handsome) kitten with folded ears by his then girlfriend. The girlfriend went but Norton stayed - in fact, he and Peter became inseparable. Trotting along beside him down the street having his own chair in restaurants or sitting on Peter's lap on plane...

The award-winning Music and Silence is one of Tremain's most popular works. Set in the court of Christian IV of Denmark during the seventeenth century, it is a beautiful and enduring tale of love, intrigue and betrayal. Part history, part imagination, Music and Silence lyrically evokes the rich tapestry of court life.

A brilliant and gripping tale set to become an international bestseller. When a young girl discovers an ancient and disturbing book in her father's library, she re-opens a dark chapter in his past. Her father turns out to be an expert on the real Vlad the Impaler.

The rise and rise of the Bin Laden family is one of the world's great stories of the 20th century: the repercussions of that rise have, of course, already deeply marked the 21st century. And yet it is a story that has never been properly told.

The Ultimate Classic Collection is drawn from our extensive back catalogue of over 300 short stories and showcases some of the finest examples of the genre: from romance to horror, detective and crime stories to the best of women's writing. The stories in this superb collection are as follows: The Girl from Arles...

**** NEW OFFER - This title now comes with the Audio Transfer INCLUDED to enable more listeners to access this amazing audio experience **** This recording of Thomas Mann's classic novel of desire and self-destruction won the award for Best Abridged Fiction Classic at the 1995 Talkies Awards. It is read by Dirk Bogarde, who played the role of the doomed hero in the film version of the novel.

A Genius performance by Penelope Keith!

BBC Full Cast Dramatisation of The Curious Curate and The Buried Treasure.

Agatha Raisin - the Columbo of the Cotswolds - is back in two more full-cast dramas based on the bestselling books by M.C. Beaton. In Agatha Raisin and The Potted Gardener, when a garden festival is announced, the village of Carsely is gripped with enthusiasm for water features and mulch. But when her arch...

A Genius Performance by Penelope Keith! She stars as Agatha Raisin in two full-cast BBC Radio 4 dramas. After a lifetime spent in public relations, the drinking and smoking one-woman dynamo that is Agatha Raisin struggles to adapt to life in a quiet Cotswold village. Penelope Keith stars again as Agatha Raisin - Miss Marple with attitude - in these two full-cast dramas based on the bestselling books by M.C. Beaton.

This is the fourth volume in the "M.C. Beaton" mystery series, starring Penelope Keith. It contains four stories that include "The Wizard of Evesham", "The Moment of Truth", "The Murderous Marriage", and "The Disappearing Trick". "The Wizard of Evesham":

Sea, sand ... and the slammer for Agatha! Agatha Raisin thinks she's in for a treat when her ex-husband, James Lacey, invites her on holiday, but - horrors! - his idea of an idyllic break is the small, run-down resort of Burryhill-on-Sea. And from there on, things go from bad to worse. So when a fellow guest in their...

It's rare for a young woman to die from a stroke and when three such deaths occur in short order it starts to look like an epidemic. Then a sharp pathologist notices traces of benzodiazepine in one of the victim's blood samples and just traceable damage to the ligaments in her neck, and their cause of death...

Isabel Dalhousie, Edinburgh philosopher and curious observer of the behaviour of her fellow man, is approached by a friend at a local boarding school that is planning to appoint a new headmaster; an anonymous letter has arrived suggesting that one of the shortlisted candidates has a compromising past. But which one is it? Isabel is once...

A Genius Performance by Derek Jacobi! Ellis Peters' medieval sleuth is one of the best loved characters in the history of British crime fiction; now, together for the first time, here are three of his finest cases in one collection. With the author's eye for a gripping plot and the frailties of human nature, and a peerless performance by Sir Derek Jacobi, this is the perfect audio collection for Ellis Peters listeners old and new.

A reading of the novellisation from the wonderful TV show. Perfect for Downton fans!

One of the most inventive and charming retellings of the Arthurian legend, this is the final part of The Once and Future King. In these last two books, the ageing king faces the greatest challenge of his reign, when his own son threatens to overthrow him and destroy everything he has worked for. In The Book of Merlyn, Arthur's tutor Merlyn...

Clarence, ninth Earl of Emsworth, sank back in his chair, looking like the good old man in a Victorian melodrama whose mortgage the villain had just foreclosed. He felt the absence of that gentle glow which customarily accompanied the departure of one of his sisters. Lord Emsworth needed Galahad.

This title features, The Dying Detective, The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax, The Devil's Foot and His Last Bow. Clive Merrison stars as Holmes with Michael Williams as Watson in these adventures, part of the unique fully dramatised BBC canon of Conan Doyle's short stories and novels featuring the world-famous sleuth.

George Smiley is one of the most brilliantly realised characters in British fiction. Bespectacled, tubby, eternally middle-aged and deceptively ordinary, he has a mind like a steel trap and is said to possess ‘the cunning of Satan and the conscience of a virgin’. When a Russian émigré is found murdered on Hampstead Heath, Smiley is called out of retirement to exorcise some Cold War ghosts from his clandestine past.

Smiley, now head of the Circus, must rebuild trust in the shattered organization. He is also determined to destroy his nemesis, Karla, and his spy networks. He recruits Jerry Westerby, occasional spy, occasional news reporter, full-time romantic - the Honourable Schoolboy of the title - and despatches him to the Far East, where, amidst the corruption and decay of former colonies, a new battle is about to begin...

Winner of the 2013 Audible Sounds of Crime Award Its 25 years since John Rebus appeared on the scene, and 5 years since he retired. But 2012 sees his return in Standing in Another Man's Grave. Not only is Rebus as stubborn and anarchic as ever, but he finds himself in trouble with Rankin's latest creation...

Mrs Gentle has fooled everyone into thinking she is as sweet as she sounds – gentle by name and gentle by nature. But local constable Hamish Macbeth isn't fooled. He believes this little old lady is actually quite sly and vicious, but he's in a minority of one. Or is he? When Mrs Gentle dies under unusual...

Penniless Elinor is rather surprised at the carriage that meets her from the stage, and more so at the decayed grandeur of the house to which she's transported. Realising that there has been a case of mistaken identity she agrees to an audacious plan.

Finding so young and pretty a girl as Amanda wandering unattended, Sir Gareth Ludlow knows it is his duty as a man of honour to restore her to her family. But it is to prove no easy task for the Corinthian. His captive in spring muslin has more than her rapturous good looks and bandboxes to aid her - she is ...

A fascinating look into a tumultuous interlude in British history and the life of Bonnie Prince Charlie This brilliantly entertaining novel is a fictionalization of the true story of Charles II (May 29, 1630—February 6, 1685), charting his daring flight to France after the Battle of Worcester, where Cromwell and...

The three great-nephews of cantankerous Mr Penicuik know better than to ignore his summons, especially when it concerns the bestowal of his fortune. His freakish plan is that his fortune will be his step-daughter's dowry.

Shortlisted for the 2006 Costa Novel Award. Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2006 January. 1982. Thirteen-year-old Jason Taylor - covert stammerer and reluctant poet - anticipates a stultifying year in his backwater English village. But he hasn't reckoned with bullies, simmering family discord, the Falklands War, a threatened gypsy invasion and those mysterious entities known as girls. Charting thirteen months in the black hole between childhood and adolescence...

The legend of the Headless Horseman and a proposed marriage de convenance both have their impact on the mystery of a golden talisman ring and Lord Lavenham's young heir, Ludovic. Neither Sir Tristram Shield nor Eustacie, his young French cousin, share the slightest inclination to marry one another...

Sunday Times number-one best seller Ian Rankin returns with his gripping new Rebus novel. Unabridged edition featuring a bonus interview with Ian Rankin and James MacPherson. Rebus is back on the force, albeit with a demotion and a chip on his shoulder. A 30-year-old case is being reopened, and Rebus' team from back then is suspected of foul play. With Malcolm Fox as the investigating officer, are the past and present about to collide in a shocking and...