Agatha Christie’s most famous murder mystery, read by director and star of the hugely anticipated 2017 film adaptation, Kenneth Branagh. Just after midnight, a snowdrift stops the Orient Express in its tracks. The luxurious train is surprisingly full for the time of the year, but by the morning...
Nick Buckley was an unusual name for a pretty young woman. But then she had led an unusual life. First, on a treacherous Cornish hillside, the brakes on her car failed. Then, on a coastal path, a falling boulder missed her by inches. Later, an oil painting fell and almost crushed her in bed.
Sharpe’s Havoc brings Sharpe to Portugal, and reunites him with Harper. It is 1809 and Lieutenant Sharpe, who belongs to a small British army that has a precarious foothold in Portugal, is sent to look for Kate Savage, the daughter of an English wine shipper.
A Genius Performance by Edward Petherbridge! In this autobiographical work Edward Petherbridge recounts his time at the National Theatre and his life as a jobbing actor. Wonderfully whitty and full of real life insights, this book will take you back to the great days of The Master (Olivier) ....
When Commissario Brunetti is summoned to the hospital bedside of a senior paediatrician whose skull has been fractured, he is confronted with more questions than answers. Three men, a Carabinieri captain and two privates from out of town, have burst into the doctor's apartment....
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...
Among the towering red cliffs of Petra, like some monstrous swollen Buddha, sat the corpse of Mrs Boynton. A tiny puncture mark on her wrist was the only sign of the fatal injection that had killed her.
Barchester Towers is Anthony Trollope's comic masterpiece. Ranged either side of the unfathomable Victorian divide between the High Anglican clergy and their modern, evangelical brethren we meet the saintly Septimus Harding and the furious Archdeacon Grantly and, opposing, the fearsome ...
In the run up to the biggest NASCAR raceweek of the year, Dr Temperance Brennan is called to a landfill site backing onto the Charlotte speedway track in north Carolina. Someone has discovered a barrel of hardened asphalt with a human hand poking through the top. With the country's press trained...
Thomas Porteous is in the final stages of dying. His wife Di is both scared for him and for herself. Soon his family will turn up to claim their share's of the loot. The art collection they shared is very valuable.
This set contains unabridged audio versions of the first three Harry Potter books - the perfect gift for young witches and wizards. They might not be on the Hogwarts Express but they can still enjoy the magic of these timeless tales. Narrated by Stephen Fry, they follow the young wizard Harry ......
A new, fully updated edition of David Attenborough’s groundbreaking Life on Earth. David Attenborough’s unforgettable meeting with gorillas became an iconic moment for millions of television viewers. Life on Earth, the series and accompanying book, fundamentally changed the way we view and interact with..
"Suddenly, in the space of a moment, I realized what it was that I loved about Britain--which is to say, all of it. Every last bit of it, good and bad--old churches, country lanes, people saying 'Mustn't grumble' and 'I'm terribly sorry but,' people apologizing to me when I conk them with a careless elbow, milk in bottles, beans on toast ...
Smiley's People is one of John le Carré's classic Cold War novels and George Smiley one of his most acclaimed characters. Into a shadowy, violent and intricate world steeped in moral ambivalence steps George Smiley, sometime acting Chief of the Circus, as the Secret Service is known.
Now a major BBC drama: The Strike series. When a troubled model falls to her death from a snow-covered Mayfair balcony, it is assumed that she has committed suicide. However, her brother has his doubts, and calls in private investigator Cormoran Strike to look into the case. Strike is a war veteran -...
Renee Ballard works the midnight shift in Hollywood, beginning many investigations but finishing few, as each morning she turns everything over to the daytime units. It's a frustrating job for a once up-and-coming detective, but it's no accident. She's been given this beat as punishment after filing a sexual...
While playing an erratic round of golf, Bobby Jones slices his ball over the edge of a cliff. His ball is lost, but on the rocks below he finds the crumpled body of a dying man. With his final breath the man opens his eyes and says, 'Why didn't they ask Evans?' Haunted by these words, Bobby and his vivacious...
In the second novel in the Pop Larkin series, the Larkin family descends upon Brittany in France. Like fish out of water, they find that things don't quite turn out their way: the weather is less than ideal, the food is awful and the hotel is in a bad state of repair. But things slowly improve as Pop manages to ...
C. S. Lewis is one of the most influential Christian writers of our time. But while it was clear from the start that he would be a writer, it was not always clear he would become a Christian. A Life Observed tells the inspiring story of Lewis' spiritual journey from cynical atheist to joyous Christian. Drawing on Lewis'...
A memoir by the iconic singer-songwriter chronicling her story from her beginnings in Brooklyn through her remarkable success as one of the world's most acclaimed musical talents
The evidence is in: you can reduce cancer risk and support treatment by focusing on six key areas of health and wellness. The scientific data on the link between lifestyle, environmental factors, and cancer risk has been accumulating at an accelerated rate over the past decade: Every week we learn...
A young man accompanies his cousin to the hospital to check an unusual hearing complaint and recalls a story of a woman put to sleep by tiny flies crawling inside her ear; a mirror appears out of nowhere and a nightwatchman is unnerved as his reflection tries to take control of him; a couple's relationship...
This is the inspiring story of how one man realized his dream of witnessing firsthand the most dramatic of meteorological events: the Indian monsoon. Alexander Frater spent the first six years of his life on a South Pacific island, where his father, the only doctor within a thousand square miles, encouraged...
Lord Peter Wimsey, noted detective, scholar and bon vivant, calls upon all his skills when murder strikes close to home. Too close. The victim? His sister's fiancé. The accused? The Duke of Denver, Lord Peter's brother. As the Duke goes on trial for his life in the House of Lords, Lord Peter, together with his...
A Radio 4 dramatization of Dickens's novel set against the bustle of a mighty city. Humbled and alone, his trading empire in ruins, the cold and uncaring Dombey seems doomed. But the love of his daughter brings redemption and understanding to a man whose only reason for living was Dombey and Son.
In this atmospheric and profoundly moving debut, Cathy and Daniel live with their father, John, in the remote woods of Yorkshire, in a house the three of them built themselves. John is a gentle brute of a man, a former enforcer who fights for money when he has to, but who otherwise just wants to be left ...
The world reels from the assassination of the Mad Empress. The Aelarian Empire is cracking. From the ashes of a burnt world, warlords, barbarians, and rebels emerge to claim the remains. Outside the walls of Aelar, different factions converge. Tribal warriors prepare to shatter the gates.
Could you be happier at work . . . in love . . . in life? You may not need a total overhaul - just a few good Happiness Hacks! Here are hundreds of shortcuts to brighten your day and boost your mood - and the science behind how they work. Discover why: 57°F (13.9°C) is the happiest temperature Selfies give you...
First published in 1939. The author captures the song of his nation of singers and made it into the story of the childhood and youth of Huw Morgan, a miner's son, in a South Wales valley.
If you have trouble distinguishing the verbs imitate and emulate, the relative pronouns that and which, or the adjectives pliant, pliable, and supple, never fear-How to Tell Fate from Destiny is here to help! With more than 500 headwords, the book is replete with advice on how to differentiate commonly...
Over a storied career, Daniel C. Dennett has engaged questions about science and the workings of the mind. His answers have combined rigorous argument with strong empirical grounding. And a lot of fun. Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking offers seventy-seven of Dennett's most successful...
In her most powerful novel yet, New York Times bestselling author Marie Bostwick weaves the uplifting story of three grief support group dropouts—women united in loss and rescued through friendship. Fifteen years ago, Grace Saunders vowed to take her beloved husband for better or worse. Now she’s coming...
I couldn't play on the same playground as the white kids. I couldn't go to their schools. I couldn't drink from their water fountains. There were so many things I couldn't do. In 1963 Birmingham, Alabama, thousands of African American children volunteered to march for their civil rights after hearing Dr. Martin...
Five years ago Randall Gyre was convicted of the brutal rape of a young student, Lizzie Fane, on the Isle of Wight. Handsome, rich, slick-talking, Gyre had avoided prison for years before that, despite a string of accusations. Forensic psychologist Karen Taylor is certain that Gyre will attack again, and this time he..
No one does glamour, severity, girlish charm or tight-lipped witticism better than Dame Maggie Smith, one of Britain's best-loved actors. This new biography shines the stage lights on the life and career of a truly remarkable performer, one whose stage and screen career spans six decades. From her days as a...
The nonfiction debut from beloved international sensation and New York Times best-selling author Tatiana de Rosnay: her best-selling biography of novelist Daphne du Maurier. "It's impressive how Tatiana was able to recreate the personality of my mother, including her sense of humor. It is very well written and...
For eleven seasons, Marion Ross was head of one of America’s favorite television households. Now meet the lovable real-life woman behind the Happy Days mom. Before she was affectionately known to millions as “Mrs. C.,” Marion Ross began her career as a Paramount starlet who went on to appear in nearly...
What is autism: a devastating developmental condition, a lifelong disability, or a naturally occurring form of cognitive difference akin to certain forms of genius? In truth it is all of these things and more - and the future of our society depends on our understanding it. Following on from his groundbreaking...
When you think of a Christian pastor, you probably don't envision a tattooed 30-something who wears a motorcycle jacket, listens to hip-hop music, references The Walking Dead and Black Lives Matter in his sermons, and every Sunday draws a standing-room only crowd to a venue normally used for rock...
The classic bestseller from the master of the game Harry Manning had fled the Cuban revolution, sacrificing everything for freedom and seeking solace on the tranquil waters of the Bahamas. For a time he found solace in the arms of the beautiful Maria and oblivion in alcohol. Then once again his life is ...
From interpreting the world to changing it, a synthesis of Chomsky's early work on philosophy, linguistics, and politics. Originally delivered in 1971 as the first Cambridge lectures in memory of Bertrand Russell, Problems of Knowledge and Freedom is a masterful and cogent synthesis of Noam Chomsky's ...
Every table at Quentins Restaurant has a thousand stories to tell: tales of love, betrayal and revenge. Ella Brady wants to make a documentary about the renowned Dublin restaurant that has captured the spirit of a generation and a city in the years it has been open. In Maeve Binchy's magical Quentins, you...
From the author of Proust and the Squid, a lively, ambitious, and deeply informative epistolary book that considers the future of the reading brain and our capacity for critical thinking, empathy, and reflection as we become increasingly dependent on digital technologies. A decade ago, Maryanne Wolf’s Proust...
"Slut" is a great word. It just sounds perfect-so sharp and clear and beautiful. It's one of those satisfying four letter words, like cunt and fuck. Slut also happens to be an anagram for lust, which is one of those divine coincidences that makes you wonder if God actually exists. We're lucky that slut is such...
As our civilization rushes headlong toward collapse, it seems there is nothing we can do to avert catastrophe...or is there? For decades Americans were vaguely aware that Islamist barbarians were in the deserts of the Middle East and in the mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan, executing "infidels" and...
"The father of cognitive neuroscience" illuminates the past, present, and future of the mind-brain problem How do neurons turn into minds? How does physical "stuff" - atoms, molecules, chemicals, and cells - create the vivid and various worlds inside our heads? The problem of consciousness has gnawed...
In The Genius of Birds, acclaimed author Jennifer Ackerman explores the newly discovered brilliance of birds and how it came about. Consider, as Ackerman does, the Clark's nutcracker, a bird that can hide as many as 30,000 seeds over dozens of square miles and remember where it put them several months...
Midwich was a quiet English village where nothing ever happened. But then one night, a curious occurence resulted in the village being cut off from the outside world for a day - and the inhabitants were unable to remember anything.
Mim Lyons is a retired film actress, occasionally still recognised from her last great starring role in the late 1960s, but she's now more than content to stay away from the limelight. When her agent calls out of the blue with a job offer, her husband begins to have his own dreams and schemes about the ...
Stirringly evocative, thought provoking, and often jaw dropping, The Operator ranges across SEAL Team Operator Robert O'Neill's awe-inspiring 400-mission career that included his involvement in attempts to rescue "Lone Survivor" Marcus Luttrell and abducted-by-Somali-pirates Captain Richard Phillips and...
From the writings of Marie Nicolaevna Romanavna, age 19, July 17, 1918 - Midnight, in bed with her sister, Anastasia (Shvybz), in the Ipatiev Mansion in Ekaterinburg, during the last night of their lives. "So much of my story unfolds by moonlight. This is a tale of midnight wakings and forced marches ...
We know of psychopaths from chilling headlines and stories in the news and movies - from Ted Bundy and John Wayne Gacy, to Hannibal Lecter and Dexter Morgan. As Dr. Kent Kiehl shows, psychopaths can be identified by a checklist of symptoms that includes pathological lying; lack of empathy, guilt...
This was Milne's first and final venture into the detective and mystery genre, despite its immediate success and an offer of two thousand pounds for his next mystery novel. The story is set in the quaint, English countryside at the house party of Mark Ablett, where a murder quickly takes place.
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION 2016 WINNER OF THE EDGAR AWARD FOR BEST FIRST NOVEL 2016 WINNER OF THE CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE IN FICTION 2016 It is April 1975, and Saigon is in chaos. At his villa, a general of the South Vietnamese army is drinking whiskey and, with the...
From the bestselling author of When I'm Gone and Working Fire comes a gripping novel about a mother, her missing daughter, and the dark secrets that engulf them. Ever since her husband's death collided with the birth of her daughter, postpartum depression has taken hold of Veronica Shelton. She can't...
This Was a Man is the seventh and final, captivating instalment of the Clifton Chronicles from master storyteller Jeffrey Archer. This Was a Man opens with a shot being fired, but who pulled the trigger, and who lives and who dies? In Whitehall, Giles Barrington discovers the truth about his wife Karin from...
The co-authors of the New York Times best-selling NurtureShock turn their attentions to the cutting edge science behind life's triumphs and failures and offer insight from politics, finance, science, sports and economics to tip the odds in your favor.
Amy Alkon presents Unf*ckology, a "science-help" book that knocks the self-help genre on its unscientific ass. You can finally stop fear from being your boss and put an end to your lifelong social suckage. Have you spent your life shrinking from opportunities you were dying to seize but feel "that's just who I am"?
Based on the true stories of the two US Navy Seals operating behind enemy lines in Vietnam with the super top-secret unit MACV-SOG (Military Assistance Command Vietnam, Special Operations Group) US Navy Seal Lieutenant Tom Norris, on three separate occasions over a four day period, with no sleep...
We Bought a Zoo is about one young family, a broken down zoo, and the wild animals that changed their lives forever. When Ben [played by Damon] and his wife Katherine [played by Johansson] sold their small flat in Primrose Hill, upped sticks with their children, and invested their savings into a dilapidated zoo...
The Instant New York Times Bestseller Shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction A searing, deeply moving memoir about family, love, loss, and forgiveness from the critically acclaimed, bestselling National Book Award-winning author of The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian.
Smiley's People is one of John le Carré's classic Cold War novels and George Smiley one of his most acclaimed characters. Into a shadowy, violent and intricate world steeped in moral ambivalence steps George Smiley, sometime acting Chief of the Circus, as the Secret Service is known.
I could see that still no one had been able to get out from the cockpit. It must have been at this moment that I thought I was going to die because I became remarkably calm.' Trapped inside a burning Lancaster bomber, 20,000 feet above Berlin, airman John Martin consigned himself to his fate and turned his...
Fusing Keatsian mists and mellow fruitfulness with the vitality, the immediacy and the colour-hit of Pop Art - via a bit of skulduggery - Autumn is a witty excavation of the present by the past. Autumn is a take on popular culture and a meditation in a world growing ever more bordered; what constitutes...
Dick Dunster and Philip Progmire have been friends since their days at school. They have also been adversaries. Progmire's thespian longings, nurtured since he was a university actor, are now submerged in his work as an accountant with Megapolis Television. Dunster is also at Megapolis, engaged on an exposé...
No matter what you see, no matter what you’ve heard, assume nothing. Adam and Sophie Warner and their three-year-old daughter are vacationing in Washington State’s Hood Canal for Memorial Day weekend. It’s the perfect getaway to unplug—and to calm an uneasy marriage. But on Adam’s first day out...
So you lot want to be pilots? Bloody hell, Stalin’s had it now!' were the withering words of the corporal as he eyed his young National Service recruits for the first time. This autobiographical account, written 60 years later, tells of 'the most exciting years' of James Stevenson’s life when, aged 18, he learnt to be a jet...
I was anxious to fight. Hitler was the bastard who had started all this and he needed sorting out. We were under threat. Everything we stood for: our country, our families and our way of life was being attacked by this maniac. He could not be allowed to win. So for me and many, many others like me, there was no...
This is the story of Kitty Fane, the adulterous wife of a bacteriologist stationed in Hong Kong. When her husband discovers her deception, he exacts a terrible vengeance: Kitty must accompany him to the heart of a cholera epidemic in China. The Painted Veil was recently made into a feature film starring Edward...
Charles Henstock, vicar of Thrush Green, is living in his new vicarage after the old one burned down. In its place are eight retirement homes, but there's heated debate in the village about the new residents. How to choose who will live there? How will they get on together? And how will they accommodate all...
Doctor Thorne, the third novel in Anthony Trollope's Chronicles of Barsetshire, steers away from the church politics featured in the first two novels and move towards the scandals and prejudice of the upper tiers of Victorian era aristocracies. Frank Gresham, only son of a bankrupt landowner, falls in love with the...
In the late seventies, an extraordinary document came to light which for fifty years had been held on deposit by the bankers of the deceased John Herbert Watson MD - better known to devotees of Conan Doyle as Dr Watson. A continuous narrative in the doctor's own hand, the story opens in the East End of...
When Beck Holiday lost her father in the North Tower on 9/11, she also lost her memories of him. Eighteen years later, she’s a tough New York City cop burdened with a damaging secret, suspended for misconduct, and struggling to get her life in order. Meanwhile, a mysterious letter arrives informing her...
In Volume II of the Flashman Papers, Flashman tangles with femme fatale Lola Montez and the dastardly Otto Von Bismarck in a battle of wits which will decide the destiny of a continent. In this volume of The Flashman Papers, Flashman, the arch-cad and toady, matches his wits, his talents for deceit and...
When a Japanese-American is charged with the murder of a local fisherman, more than one man’s guilt is at stake. Soon to be a major film starring Ethan Hawke, directed by Scott Hicks (Shine). San Piedro Island in Puget Sound is a place so isolated that no one who lives there can afford to make enemies.
In 1966 England won the World Cup at Wembley. Sir Bobby Charlton, England's greatest ever player, was there on the pitch. Now, 50 years on, Sir Bobby looks back on the most glorious moment of his life and England's greatest sporting achievement. In 1966 he takes us through the buildup to the tournament and...
A harrowing debut novel of a tragic disappearance and one sister’s journey through the trauma that has shaped her life. For eleven-year-old Esme, ballet is everything - until her four-year-old sister, Lily, vanishes without a trace and nothing is certain anymore. People Esme has known her whole life suddenly...
Enver Eleven is twenty-five years old and ready for adventure. He’s the Agency’s newest recruit, eager to leap through his first gate into an unfamiliar time. In Enver’s home city of Johannesburg, fair-skinned people are a rarity and have been for centuries. The people of Johannesburg were spared the ravages of...
The second of Richard Hannay's adventures takes him from the trenches of the First World War on a mission of vital importance to the British campaign in the East. In an attempt to manipulate their Turkish allies the Germans have created a religious figurehead, a prophet of a new order to unify the disparate...
John Updike's first collection of new short fiction since the year 2000, My Father's Tears finds the author in a valedictory mood as he mingles narratives of his native Pennsylvania with stories of New England suburbia and of foreign travel. Morocco (Disc 1, Track 1) Personal Archaeology (Disc 1, Track 31)...