Sir Peter Ustinov's beautifully crafted autobiography is told with exquisite wit and insight. From his birth in April 1921, it spans his extraordinary career as actor, playwright, film star and director, confirming his early belief that he is 'irrevocably betrothed to laughter'.
When Harry Patch wrote his memoir in 2007, he was the last British soldier alive to have fought in the trenches of the First World War. He was 109 years old and one of very few people who could directly recall the horror of that conflict.
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
Simon Barnes is one of Britain's leading bird writers and humorists. His weekly column in The Times, his essays for the RSPB magazine and his two books on bad bird-watching have made him one of the characters of the bird world.
Dickens's story of solitary miser Ebenezer Scrooge, who is taught the true meaning of Christmas by the three ghosts of Christmas past, present and future, has been adapted into countless film and stage versions and is today the most famous and loved of all Christmas tales.
Marking the 175 anniversary of Charles Dickens’ immortal classic ‘A Christmas Carol’, celebrated actor Simon Callow and one of the world’s most respected brass bands The Brighouse and Rastrick Band join forces for this very special Christmas album. It combines Simon Callow’s acclaimed adaptation of Charles...
January 1954. Mists cover the hills around Selchester. Someone at the research facility known as the Atomic is leaking secrets to Soviet Russia, and when nuclear scientist Bruno Rothesay goes missing, the British Intelligence Services are convinced he’s the mole. Hugo Hawksworth isn’t so sure.
A half-starved young Russian man in a long black overcoat is smuggled into Hamburg at dead of night. He has an improbable amount of cash secreted in a purse round his neck. He is a devout Muslim. Or is he? He says his name is Issa.
A new saga from the author of OTHER PEOPLE'S MARRIAGES, about a woman living in America, who has a happy, normal family life, but who also has a secret connected with England which could tear her marriage apart.
Set in 1915 on the treacherous rivers of war-torn Africa, this production features Charlie Allnut, a gin-drinking river trader, who reluctantly agrees to help the prim missionary, Rose Sayer, to travel down the river and destroy a German gun boat.
Eddie Chapman: rogue, criminal, confidence trickster, hero to both sides and betrayer of all. At the start of the Second World War, Chapman was recruited by the German Secret Service. He was a highly prized Nazi agent.
Every New Yorker's worst nightmare is about to become a reality. New York has seen more than its fair share of horrific attacks, but the city is about to be shaken in a way it never has before. After two devastating catastrophes in quick succession, everyone is on edge.
A Genius Performance by Emilia Fox! When orphaned Arthur Hobhouse is shipped to Australia after WWII he loses his sister, his country and everything he knows.
When Lord Cardross married 18 year old Lady Helen he also undertook the task of staving off financial disaster for her father, and settled the more pressing gambling debts of her brother. Has Lady Helen only married him for his money?
The year is 1199, the place the Welsh Marches. Young Arthur de Caldicot is given a shining stone in which his legendary namesake is revealed. In 100 short chapters that brilliantly evoke life in a medieval manor, stories of the boy King Arthur ....
This box set contains over 7 hours of fun from Bob the Builder, Fireman Sam and Tomas the Tank Engine! This would make a brilliant gift that will last considerably longer than the New Year!
This poignant novel explores how a unilateral decision can change a life. Two things are hard for Joel Gustafson to cope with: not knowing why, and not being able to do anything about it. Joel's father was once a sailor who lived by the sea. Joel's mother once lived with them.
Whether you listen to this on a dark winter's night of a sunny summer morning Leonard Rossiter's performance will take you on a journey. This is a perfect combination of text and performer. Leonard Rossiter makes this text his own and with such a quality of delivery that, if you close your eyes, you are there!
After seven years of marriage, Lady Brenda is bored with country life at Hetton Abbey. She drifts into an affair with shallow young socialite John Beaver and forsakes her unsuspecting husband Tony as she becomes more and more involved with the glamorous Belgravia set.
Growing up on a dairy farm in the mountains of British Columbia in the 1960s, three kilometres north of the American border, Natalie Ward knew little of the outside world. But she had her family. A family so close and loving that Natalie believed they were the envy of the nearby town....
This is a perfect example of why Brainfood Audiobooks exists! William (Willie) Rushton brings all of his comedic talent to bear on this wonderful tale. This audio set comes with a complimentary Audio CD version of this book.
While in Moscow, historian Fluke Kelso is approached by someone claiming to have been present when Stalin died, but a simple check into the old man's story turns into a murderous chase into the dark forests of northern Russia near the White Sea port of Archangel.
His reading of this book makes it come alive in a way none of us have ever heard before - a Must Listen if ever we heard one!
A gang war is raging through the dark underworld of Brighton. Untouched by human feeling, Pinkie is isolated, a figure of pure evil. Believing he can escape retribution, he is unprepared for the courageous, life-embracing Ida Arnold, who is determined to avenge Hale's death.
A year after her husband's death, young widow and art collector Diana Porteous listlessly roams the beach near her home. Her friend and agent Saul takes action, introducing her to his stylish, anarchic sister, Sarah, to pep her up.
Cat O' Nine Tales is the sixth collection of irresistible short stories from the master storyteller,illustrated by the internationally acclaimed artist, Ronald Searle, creator of Molesworth. These twelve yarns are satisfying and ingeniously plotted, featuring richly drawn characters and Jeffrey Archer's ...
A soldier wounded in the Civil War, Inman turns his back on the carnage of the battlefield and begins the treacherous journey home to Cold Mountain, and to Ada, the woman he loved before the war began. As Inman attempts to make his way across the mountains, through the devastated landscape....
Much in need of a holiday, Mel and the Doctor head for Paradise Towers: a luxury man-made planet with sparkling fountains, sunny streets, exotic flowers and a shimmering blue swimming pool. But when the TARDIS materialises in a dark, rubbish-filled, rat-infested alley it seems that this....
Can it be right to persist in a bigamous marriage? Mr. Peacocke, a classical scholar, has come to Broughtonshire with his beautiful American wife to live as a schoolmaster. But when the blackmailing brother of her first husband - a reprobate from Louisiana - appears at the school gates...
Terry Jones, Joan Greenwood, Michael Hordern, Bob Hoskins, Helen Mirren and Tim Rice read of a collection of original fairy tales for 8 to 11-year-olds, written by master storyteller Terry Jones, introducing such bizarre creatures as the fly-by-night, the rainbow cat, and the wonderful cake-horse.
Highlights from the The soundtrack of the 1964 production of "Hamlet", directed by John Gielgud, starring Richard Burton, and filmed in front of a live audience.
Seven-year-old Che was abandoned by his radical Havard-student parents during the upheaval of the 1960s, and since then has been raised in isolated privilege by his New York grandmother. He yearns to see or hear news of his famous outlaw parents, but his grandmother refuses to tell him anything.
Nimoy tells his own story. As the coldly logical Mister Spock in "Star Trek" - first a TV series, later a series of feature films - he created a character who is one of the 20th century's most recognizable cultural icons. He is now also a respected film director in his own right.
Actress, comedienne and raconteur Joyce Grenfell tells the fascinating story of her life working in radio, film, the stage and war-time entertainment tours with her usual charm and much humour. Her glamorous and madcap American mother, her aunt Nancy Astor and her husband Reggie...
Dozens of books have been published recently on the errors and biases that affect our judgments and choices. Drawing on cognitive science, their lessons are excellent for many kinds of decisions - consumer choice and financial investments, for example - but stop short of addressing many of....
In the internationally bestselling vein of The Paris Wife and Z: a novel of Zelda Fitzgerald this biographical novel is set in the early 1900s when polite Chicago society was rocked by terrible scandal when renowned architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, ran off with Mamah Cheney, a client's wife.
Mansfield Park is the story of Fanny Price: the earnest, gentle girl of humble origins sent to live with Sir Thomas Bertram and his family in Mansfield Park. There she discovers a world of flirtation, betrayal, and prejudice - but she also finds love. Fanny is often thought of as Austen's most difficult heroine to warm to, but her quiet, serious nature hides a loyal and loving heart, and her patient devotion is ultimately rewarded.
This stunning performance of Actors of Dionysus brings alive Euripides' timeless tragedy of a woman scorned and desperate to wreak a terrible vengeance.
In short mysteries so brilliantly plotted they'll confound the cleverest of souls, Inspector Morse remains as patient as a cat at a mouse hole in the face of even the most resourceful evildoers. Muldoon, for instance, the one-legged bomber with one fatal weakness . .
One of Dickens' earlier novels, dating from 1839, it charts the fortunes of an honourable young man, Nicholas Nickleby, who has set out to make his way in the world. Dickens presents his remarkably vivid display of Victorian characters and the life they lead, from the generous to the fated to crushed. Naxos
Big Brother is watching you...1984 is the year in which it happens.The world is divided into three great powers: Oceania, Eurasia, and Eastasia, each perpetually at war with the other. Throughout Oceania 'The Party' rules by the agency of four ministries whose power is absolute and where every action, word, gesture and thought is monitored. In The Ministry of Truth, which deals in propaganda, Winston Smith's job is to edit the past.
Jean Paul Sartre said, ‘Hell is other people’. But, as Satan will tell you, Hell is actually a fiery, unendingly cruel domain where Oliver Reed can never quite catch the barman’s eye and Yves St Laurent is forced to wear a donkey jacket. But Hell is about to become more hellish for Satan himself (Andy Hamilton).
It's early in the final week. The props and players for Friday's drama are in position. Five-inch spikes are in the bin. A cross-beam leans against a shed wall. The players are nearing the stagePilate, Annas and Caiaphas, Judas, the centurions. Players and props. Only this is no play; it's a divine plan.
Andrea Ashworth's father stopped on the way home from work one night to take a leak. He slipped in some mud, hit his head on a rock and drowned face-down in a stream less than four inches deep. Andrea was five years old; her sister was three; her mother was twenty-five.
Upon a time. Remember the faery stories you were told as a child? Tales of tiny, magical, winged beings and elves, wicked witches and goblins. Demons...
If you are interested in an atmospheric thriller of an extraordinary order - this is probably the Best Audiobook you will ever hear. A great book is transformed, by Sean Barrett, into a production of Genius! If you haven't heard it yet then you have an amazing journey before you......
Drifting in and out of consciousness following a dramatic accident on set, film director Tom Richards pictures the film he wants to make: a simple film about a very ordinary young woman. As his ambition becomes an obsession, he draws his family, his lovers and friends into a maelstrom of destruction.
A quiet summer night...a neat suburban house...and another happy family is shattered -- the latest victims of a grisly series of hideous sacrificial killings that no one understands, and no one can stop. Nobody lives to tell of the unimaginable carnage. Only the blood-stained walls bear witness.
Three stories from the Master of Mystery performed by Edward Petherbridge - Perfection! The stories are The Girl on the Train, Sing a Song of Sixpence, The Manhood of Edward Robinson. Wonderful stuff!!
Lyra and Will find themselves in the final part of the story facing great perils. But there are old friends who come to their aid, not least Iorek Byrnison, the armoured bear.
Nine-year-old Bruno knows nothing of the Final Solution or the Holocaust. He is oblivious to the appalling cruelties being inflicted on the people of Europe by his country. All he knows is that he has been moved from a comfortable home in Berlin to a house in a desolate area where there is nothing....
This collection, culled from the Caedmon archives of the past fifty years, includes such selections as John Updike's "Persistence of Desire" and Eudora Welty's "Why I Live at the P.O.," both read by the respective authors.
Captain Ean Tephe is a man of faith, whose allegiance to his lord and to his ship is uncontested. The Bishopry Militant knows this - and so, when it needs a ship and crew to undertake a secret, sacred mission to a hidden land, Tephe is the captain to whom the task is given.
Gillian Flynn’s Edgar Award-winning homage to the classic ghost story, published for the first time as a standalone. A canny young woman is struggling to survive by perpetrating various levels of mostly harmless fraud. On a rainy April morning, she is reading auras at Spiritual Palms when Susan Burke...
When the body of William arrives at the Abbey of St Peter and St Paul to be buried, the mighty prelate, Gerbert, tries to block his wish, recalling that he had been accused of heretical practices. A death ensues and Brother Cadfael is called to turn detective and solve the murder.
At the height of the hot summer of 1144, the Earl of Essex succumbs to a fatal arrow, but only after a lingering fever, during which his officials do their best to save him from hellfire by restoring various properties he has annexed, including the abbey of Ramsey.
Following Bilbo’s 111th birthday, Frodo Baggins and his companion Sam Gamgee, set off along the same East Road down which Bilbo the Hobbit had accompanied Thorin Oakenshield and his dwarves all those many years ago.
The second part of the The Lord of the Rings, following on from The Fellowship of the Ring.
Frodo and the Companions of the Ring have been beset by danger during their quest to prevent the Ruling Ring from falling into the hands of the Dark Lord by destroying it in the Cracks of Doom.
The climactic volume of the trilogy, wherein the little hobbit and his trusty companions make a terrible journey to the heart of the land of the Shadow in a final reckoning with the power of Sauron.
A Genius Performance by Ian Holm. A true breakthrough for Tolkien and the BBC. Brian Sibley's dramatisation of the fantasy epic in 1981 staring Ian Holm, Michael Hordern, Robert Stephens, John Le Mesurier and Peter Woodthorpe is an essential listen for any audiobook listener.
A good production but lacking in fire except for a great performance by Anthony Sher. Worth the price just for his work on this excellent play. The Best Merchant award has to go to the Hugh Griffith and Dorothy Tutin production.
David Niven is remembered as one of Britain's best-loved actors. The archetypal English gentleman, he starred in over ninety films. He is equally remembered as the author of this classic autobiography.
There is in the eminently quotable lines of Kipling's poetry a varying shimmer of greatness. His poems convey strong emotions of bitterness, humanity and sentiment. They are poems of kinship with humankind, of nobility, of reflected glory and the futilities of our own time.
A sinister story of the supernatural; first of five in a thrilling new series by this number one best-selling author. Matt has always known he has unusual powers. Raised in foster care, he is sent to Yorkshire on a rehabilitation programme, only to find himself in the midst of sinister goings-on.
An unabridged reading of Philip Pullman's nerve-shattering thriller, set in the murky streets and opium dens of Old London. When 16-year old Sally's father drowns in suspicious circumstances, she is left to fend for herself in Victorian London. Although she doesn't know it, she is already in terrible danger.
Annika never has a birthday – no one knows the date she was born. She celebrates her Found Day instead. For Annika was abandoned as a baby and found by a cook and a housemaid from Vienna. Her upbringing in the servants’ quarters of the house of three eccentric professors means that at an early....
Two orphaned children are on the run, hiding among the crumbling canals and misty alleyways of the city. Befriended by a gang of street children and their mysterious leader, the Thief Lord, they shelter in an old, disused cinema. On their trail is a bungling detective, obsessed with disguises and the health...
When Lockhart Flawse is catapulted out of his upper-class and rapunzel-esque life with the curmudgeonly Flawse Senior, he must enter the world of suburbia, and marriage. Rendered an absolute twit in modern society by his medieval upbringing, Lockhart must resort to drastic tactics in his attempt to return to Flawse House.
Dylan Thomas’ fantastic reading of ‘Under Milk Wood’ performed by Dylan Thomas and a remarkable cast available for the first time on CD. Under Milk Wood was originally a radio play and later a stage play and film which was written and delivered to the BBC in 1953.
We Will Remember Them is a unique recording project which brings together a cast of celebrty readers--actors, TV presenters and others in the public eye--to read poems of remembrance from times past and present, which are mixed with well known classical themes.
Elfrida Phipps loves her new life in the pretty Hampshire village, where she lives with her faithful dog Horace, and enjoys the friendship of the neighbouring Blundells - particularly Oscar. But an unforeseen tragedy upsets Elfrida's tranquillity: Oscar's wife and daughter are killed in a terrible car crash and...
This anthology contains work by over 80 female poets, including Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Emily Bronte, Emily Dickinson, Fiona Pitt-Kethley and Liz Lochead.
The most influential work of the entire Spanish literary canon and a founding work of modern Western literature, Don Quixote is also one of the greatest works ever written. Hugely entertaining but also moving at times, this episodic novel is built on the fantasy life of one Alonso Quixano, who lives with his...
A gloriously witty novel from Sebastian Faulks using P.G. Wodehouse’s much-loved characters, Jeeves and Wooster, fully authorised by the Wodehouse estate. Bertie Wooster, recently returned from a very pleasurable soujourn in Cannes, finds himself at the stately home of Sir Henry Hackwood in Dorset. Bertie is...
The nation's greatest voice, David Attenborough, reads J. A. Baker's extraordinary classic of British nature writing, The Peregrine. J. A. Baker's classic of British nature writing was first published in 1967. Greeted with acclaim, it went on to win the Duff Cooper Prize, the pre-eminent literary prize of the time.
A surgical-stocking-filler from the author of record-breaking million copy bestseller This Is Going To Hurt. Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat ... but 1.4 million NHS workers are heading off to work. This is a perfect audiobook for anyone who has ever set foot in a hospital. Adam Kay delves back into his...
THE DAZZLING FIRST BOOK FROM THE WINNER OF THE 2017 ROYAL SOCIETY INSIGHT INVESTMENT SCIENCE BOOKS PRIZE ‘A fascinating, funny, disconcerting and lucid book.’ Helen Dunmore ‘Fine sets out to demonstrate that the human brain is vainglorious and stubborn. She succeeds brilliantly.’ Mail on Sunday...
One of E. M. Forster's most celebrated novels, "A Room With a View" is the story of a young English middle-class girl, Lucy Honeychurch. While vacationing in Italy, Lucy meets and is wooed by two gentlemen, George Emerson and Cecil Vyse. After turning down Cecil Vyse's marriage proposals twice Lucy finally...
Pippi Longstocking meets Heidi meets Anne Shirley in this tale of an irrepressible girl in a mountain village who navigates unexpected changes with warmth and humor. Speed and self-confidence, that’s Astrid’s motto. Nicknamed “the little thunderbolt,” she loves to spend her days racing down the hillside on her...
She was found hanging in a dingy London bedsit with a blood orange in her mouth. Diane Heybridge, a young woman without a past or much of a future, has captured in death the compassion denied her in life. For the prosecution, this seeming suicide is nothing more than a bungled killing, and a disgusted public...
The acclaimed international bestseller now a MAJOR MOTION PICTURE starring Constance Wu, Henry Golding, Michelle Yeoh and Gemma Chan! When Rachel Chu agrees to spend the summer in Singapore with her boyfriend, Nicholas Young, she envisions a humble family home and quality time with the man she...
In the quaint town of Blue Lake, Indiana, Lena London is settling into her dream job, but someone is making her life a nightmare . . .Things are beginning to go right for Lena. She's got a new job assisting suspense novelist and friend, Camilla Graham. She lives rent-free in Camilla's beautiful, Gothic house. She ...
From the mind of the storyteller who has captured the imagination of readers from around the world and across generations comes this classic work of science fiction. First prize in the Skyway Soap slogan contest was an all-expenses-paid trip to the moon. The consolation prize was an authentic space suit,
When Oliver Bonds, a revered religious studies professor at the University of Texas, loses his toddler son and undergoes intense legal scrutiny over his involvement, grief engulfs him completely. His life is upended; Oliver loses his wife, home, and faith. Three years after his son's death, Oliver lives in a shack...
I Wasn't Strong Like This When I Started Out, a collection of true narratives, reflects the dynamism and diversity of nurses, who provide the first vital line of patient care. Here, nurses remember their first "sticks," first births, and first deaths, and reflect on what gets them though long, demanding shifts and keeps...
There are some crimes you can't sweep under the carpet.... Lena Szarka, a Hungarian cleaner working in London, knows all too well about cleaning up other people's messes. When her friend Timea disappears, she suspects one of her clients is to blame. However, the police don't share her suspicions, and it is ...
Robert Penn has saddled up nearly every day of his adult life. In his late twenties, he pedaled 25,000 miles around the world. Today he rides to get to work, sometimes for work, to bathe in air and sunshine, to travel, to go shopping, to stay sane, and to skip bath time with his kids. He's no Sunday pedal pusher.
Natty and Sean Wainwright have a rock-solid marriage and family. When their younger daughter falls ill on an overseas school trip, Natty rushes to her side. Luckily, Natty's best friend from college, Eve Dalladay, is visiting and offers to stay with Sean to lend a hand in the Wainwright household. But Natty returns...
An FBI legend, a mysterious antiquities specialist and a brazen art thief draw top FBI agents Emma Sharpe and Colin Donovan into a complex web of blackmail, greed, and murder in the eagerly awaited new novel in the highly acclaimed Sharpe & Donovan series Emma Sharpe is suspicious when retired...
The unmissable first novel from bestselling and award-winning author of THE FAULT IN OUR STARS and TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN. “In the dark beside me, she smelled of sweat and sunshine and vanilla and on that thin-mooned night I could see little more than her silhouette, but even in the dark, I could see her eyes – fierce...
Nine Parts of Desire: The Hidden World of Islamic Women is the story of Brooks' intrepid journey toward an understanding of the women behind the veils, and of the often contradictory political, religious, and cultural forces that shape their lives. In fundamentalist Iran, Brooks finagles an invitation to tea with ...